Kurt "The CyberGuy" Knutsson provides tips on how to limit the device's notifications. Do you ever feel like your Alexa device is listening to you a little too much? Do you wish you could have more control over what it says and when it says it? It's great that they can be set up to lock our doors, turn off our lights or give us the weather. STAY UPDATED WITH KURT'S FREE CYBERGUY NEWSLETTER TO GET SECURITY ALERTS, QUICK TIPS, TECH REVIEWS AND EASY HOW-TO'S TO MAKE YOU SMARTER What I don't appreciate about Alexa devices, however, is that they sometimes can give us extra information that we never asked for, which can be annoying.

Amazon confirmed it's rolling out an optional "Brief Mode" that lets Alexa users configure their Echo devices to use chimes and sounds for confirmations, instead of having Alexa respond with her voice. For example, if you ask Alexa to turn on your lights today, she will respond "okay" as she does so. But with Brief Mode enabled, Alexa will instead emit a small chime as she performs the task. The mode would be beneficial to someone who appreciates being able to control their smart home via voice, but doesn't necessarily need to have Alexa verbally confirming that she took action with each command. This is especially helpful for those who have voice-enabled a range of smart home accessories, and have gotten a little tired of hearing Alexa answer back.

Alexa has been known to be a bit annoying at times -- laughing at random, ordering items without being told to and giving users more information than they wanted. Thankfully, Amazon has developed a solution that'll make its voice assistant talk a little less. Called'Brief Mode,' it allows users to replace some of Alexa's verbal confirmations with non-verbal signals, like beeps. Amazon has confirmed that it's rolling out a feature called'Brief Mode' to all users. Brief mode turns off some of Alexa's verbal confirmations and replaces them with beeps.

Not too long ago, people got creeped out by Amazon's Alexa devices randomly laughing at them. Now Jeff Bezos' digital assistant is offering folks the chance to put a sock in its mouth. Reddit users first noticed that when asked to turn light on, Alexa would complete the task and then append the exchange by saying it'd be the last time it would use a verbal confirmation. Instead, it'd beep upon a task's completion from that point forward, noting that this was a new feature called "Brief Mode" that'd curtail its speech. That was with a first-gen Echo.

Asking Alexa to do something results in a vocal response (unless she's lost her voice), but that's not always really necessary and Amazon is experimenting with replacing Alexa's voice with other sounds to convey a response. As The Verge reports, the change in Alexa's behavior was first discussed on Reddit. One user explained that, after asking Alexa to turn on the lights, she gave the usual "OK" response, but went on to say it would be the last time she would. In future, a beep sound would replace the "OK." It's this switch to non-speech responses that Amazon is calling Brief Mode.