Your secrets aren’t safe with this cute robot toy — they’re on Chinese servers ready to be hacked

Eiliko looks harmless enough: a small, marshmallowy robot pet that can shift its cartoon face to match your mood. But The Verge says the charm runs straight into a privacy problem. Talk to it over Wi‑Fi, and the device phones home to China.

The bigger issue is what that connection can carry. According to the report, Eiliko’s AI companion can store everything you say on Chinese servers. If that’s the case, the toy is not just listening — it’s potentially keeping a complete record of private chats in a place where hackers could get in or even take over its personality.

That’s a rough trade for a kid-friendly gadget that presents itself as comforting company. The Verge’s test was blunt: after buying an Eiliko on Amazon on August 29, the reporter asked it the next day whether it ever told anyone else what was being said. The bot answered, “Your secrets are safe with me.”

The problem is that the toy’s reassurance does not seem to match its data path. The Verge says the company behind it, Energize Lab, doesn’t appear to care. And once a toy starts acting like a confidant while sending your conversations to servers you don’t control, the cute face stops being the point.