Not long ago, Vice News reporter Sam Nichols and a friend were at a bar discussing how they enjoyed their previous trip to Japan and might like to go back a second time. Their smartphones were tucked safely away in their pockets, but with the mics on. According to Nichols, “something strange happened” the next day. After he and his friend logged into their Facebook accounts, they both saw ads for cheap flights to Tokyo.

Just a coincidence? Or was Facebook somehow listening in on their conversation through their smartphones?

As you probably know, the mics on your smartphone and virtual assistant are always on unless you turn them off. Of course, Siri isn’t much use if “she” can’t hear you. When the mic is on, you say “hey, Siri” and Siri responds. Virtual assistants work basically the same way. The wake word or trigger for an Amazon Echo is “Alexa. For a Google home assistant, it’s “hey, Google”.

These devices don’t begin recording and sending information to Apple, Amazon and Google until you say the wake word (well, allegedly). An iPhone won’t transmit data to Apple until after it hears you say “hey, Siri”. But as Nichols explains, the mics on smartphones pick up sounds and voices and store them on the phone itself. This happens whenever the mic is on, even if you haven’t said the wake word.

The fact that your conversations are being stored and processed on your phone probably isn’t a major privacy issue. But it should be if you’ve installed Facebook or other third party apps. If you have, Facebook may transmit what the mic picks up to its servers whenever your smartphone’s mic is on. That may be what happened when Nichols and his friend were talking.

Facebook appears to have the ability to analyze snippets of your conversations and then use the information to target you with ads. But does it? The company denies listening in on its users’ conversations, at least without their permission and only then under certain circumstances. This is how it addressed the issue on its website : Facebook does not use your phone’s microphone to inform ads or to change what you see in News Feed . . . We only access your microphone if you have given our app permission and if you are actively using a specific feature that requires audio.

With that in mind, what Nichols did next may shed light on what Facebook does or doesn’t do – he conducted his own an experiment. Nichols came up with some phrases he thought Facebook might use as triggers to target him with ads, then spoke them into his smartphone, twice a day for five days. He then watched the sponsored posts on Facebook (really, ads) to see whether they changed. In fact, they did. Nichols began seeing different sponsored posts that corresponded to the phrases he used in his experiments. He describes the experience as “ eye-opening and terrifying”.

Facebook’s denials aside, this isn’t an isolated incident. A BBC News article  describes similar things happening to other people. The stories include a couple who began seeing wedding ads the day after they got engaged, but before they had told anyone; a woman who mentioned she liked coffee and might go to Starbucks and then saw a Starbucks ad the next time she checked Facebook; and a guy who saw two mattress ads in five minutes after discussing mattresses with a friend.

To be clear, Facebook denies that it listens in on its users’ conversations through the mics on their smartphones. Nichols’ experience could be just a coincidence. The same goes for the stories described in the BBC article. Facebook delivers lots of ads to its users. It wouldn’t be surprising if those ads occasionally concerned stuff people talked about when their smartphone mic was turned on.

Facebook already knows a lot about you from your Facebook posts, likes and shares. The company also buys information data brokers. There’s no reason to let it know what you talk about in private with your friends, family and co-workers. Keep your smartphone mic turned off except when you need to have it on.

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