From ’90s craze to NSA “spy,” Bluetooth hack target, and DJ wellness coach—Furby’s journey reveals our love for, and fear of, charming machines.
The room was dim except for the tiny pulsing glow of two plastic eyes.
Somewhere in the shadows, gears whirred and a mechanical giggle broke the silence.
It wasn’t the giggle of a child—it was stranger, higher-pitched, and followed by an oddly formal greeting in a language no human had ever spoken.
The agent froze. On the desk sat a fuzzy, owl-like creature no taller than a coffee mug. Its ears twitched. Its eyes blinked. Then, in perfect timing that felt far too deliberate, it leaned forward and chirped:
“Me spy on you?”
This was 1999, inside one of the most secure buildings in the United States.
And that creature? A Furby—an innocent toy to most, a suspected espionage device to the U.S. National Security Agency.
From ’90s Mania to Cultural Icon
If you’ve ever locked eyes with a Furby and felt like it was staring into your soul, you’re not alone. That twitchy, blinking stare and squeaky chatter have an oddly hypnotic quality—half adorable, half unsettling. It’s the kind of charm that burrows into your brain and stays there long after the batteries are removed.
To understand why a little ball of fur became one of the most talked-about toys in modern history, you have to rewind to the late 1990s—a pre-smartphone era when “connected play” meant calling a friend’s landline, and your most advanced gadget was either a Nintendo Game Boy or a Discman with anti-skip technology that didn’t always work. Toys back then were mostly analog: Barbie couldn’t livestream, Hot Wheels didn’t come with embedded chips, and Tamagotchis were cutting-edge because they could “die” and guilt you into better care.
Into this landscape waddled Furby, making its debut at the American International Toy Fair in autumn 1998. The booth was Hasbro’s, but the creature came from the imaginations of Dave Hampton, a self-described electronics tinkerer with a flair for interactive design, and Caleb Chung, an inventive toy designer with a streak for anthropomorphic charm. In a sprint that toy industry veterans still call extraordinary, they brought Furby from sketch to shelf in just nine months.
The result? A palm-sized creature that seemed to respond to the world around it. It could “see” light, “hear” sound, and “feel” movement. It spoke a babbling native tongue called Furbish, gradually sprinkling in English words to create the illusion of learning. It sneezed if you tickled it, giggled at attention, and scolded you if neglected—delivering lines like, “If you don’t play with me, I get angry.” This was not just a toy; it was a character. And the public was hooked.
By December, Furby was the must-have holiday gift, sparking store sellouts, eBay bidding wars, and the kind of parent-on-parent competition last seen in the Tickle Me Elmo craze of 1996. Demand was so high that Hasbro reportedly shipped millions in the first year. Furby wasn’t just a product; it was a cultural event.
The Power of Quirks (and a Little Deception)
Part of Furby’s magic came from its quirks—the illusion that it had moods, memories, and a growing vocabulary. Psychologists have a term for the bond people formed with it: the Tamagotchi effect. It’s the phenomenon where humans, especially children, attribute emotion, intent, and even moral standing to lifelike but inanimate entities.
For kids, this often meant treating Furby like a pet or sibling. They whispered secrets into its fuzzy ears, sang to it, and sometimes got into dramatic “breakups” when it wouldn’t behave. Adults weren’t immune either—Furby made talk show appearances, headlined magazine articles, and even earned a spot in the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History.
Yet for all its charm, Furby was not learning in any meaningful AI sense. Its “growth” was a cleverly staged sequence of pre-programmed behaviors. In an era before most people knew what “machine learning” meant, the line between programmed responses and actual intelligence was blurry. Media coverage sometimes inflated Furby’s capabilities, while urban legends grew—claims that it remembered conversations, could “learn” swear words, or secretly recorded you.
From NSA Ban to Bluetooth Woes
Some rumors took on a life of their own. In January 1999, the U.S. National Security Agency issued a ban on bringing Furbies into its facilities. The stated fear was that the toy could record and repeat classified information. In reality, Furby’s microphone could barely register words, functioning more as a pitch detector than a recorder. Still, once the idea of a spy toy made it into headlines, it stuck. Roger Shiffman, Tiger Electronics co-founder, publicly clarified: “Furby is not a spy,” but the ban became part of Furby’s legend.
The early 2000s saw Furby fade from the spotlight, only to resurface in 2005 with a more animated design and again in 2012 with LCD eyes capable of expressive animations. But in 2016, the launch of Furby Connect brought a new kind of controversy. Equipped with Bluetooth for app updates and fresh content, the toy could download songs, games, and phrases from a connected device. Security researchers soon discovered that the Bluetooth pairing lacked authentication—meaning anyone within range could hijack it to play custom audio. It was a playful vulnerability for some, but it raised serious questions about how connected toys protect children’s privacy.
Reinvention and Reflection in the AI Era
Furby’s resilience is remarkable. In 2023, Hasbro brought it back yet again, this time with over 600 responses, glowing ears, multilingual capabilities, and a voice-activated interface designed for the Alexa generation. It was less about nostalgia and more about reintroducing Furby as a viable player in a world of smart speakers, interactive pets, and app-connected everything.
The real leap came in 2025 with DJ Furby. More than a toy, it was positioned as an entertainment and wellness companion—able to spin music, lead yoga sessions, tell jokes, and run group games with flashing light shows. Toy industry analysts praised it as a platform for creativity and emotional engagement, bridging the gap between physical play and interactive media.
But the AI-saturated 2020s also brought Furby into new kinds of experiments. One viral project connected a 1990s Furby to ChatGPT, effectively giving it the power to generate improvised, context-aware conversation. The first thing it “decided” to say? A squeaky declaration of world domination. It was a joke, but it struck a nerve—highlighting the uncanny jump from predictable, pre-programmed responses to AI-driven improvisation.
A Fluffy Lens on Ethics and Emotion
Beneath the humor lies a serious question: does it matter if a machine can’t truly understand us, so long as it makes us feel understood? Emotional simulation is powerful, and researchers like MIT’s Dr. Kate Darling have shown that our bonds with robots—no matter how basic—can influence our empathy toward living beings. Toy industry expert Stevanne Auerbach has argued that interactive toys should complement, not replace, human interaction, warning that overly autonomous designs can risk social displacement, especially for young children.
The privacy implications are equally important. While Furby’s vulnerabilities have mostly been benign, the same security flaws in a more sophisticated device could be exploited for harmful purposes. As more “smart plush” toys enter the market, designers face a balancing act between interactivity, safety, and the right to data privacy—even in a playroom.
Why Furby Still Matters
Across its many iterations, Furby has been a mirror to our shifting relationship with technology. In 1998, it reflected our wonder at lifelike machines. In 1999, our fears about surveillance. In 2016, our growing awareness of the privacy risks in connected devices. And in 2025, it embodies both playful creativity and the philosophical dilemmas of AI companionship.
It’s easy to dismiss Furby as a fuzzy relic of pop culture, but its staying power reveals something deeper: our enduring desire to humanize technology—and our need to question it. Whether it’s staring up from a child’s bedside table or pulsing with disco lights on a DJ stand, Furby still blinks knowingly, as if to say it’s been watching us all along. And maybe, in its own mechanical way, it has.
References
- Global Toy News. (2025, June 18). DJ Furby and Nano-mals: Fostering creativity, emotional growth, and self-expression through play. Global Toy News. https://globaltoynews.com/2025/06/18/dj-furby-and-nano-mals-fostering-creativity-emotional-growth-and-self-expression-through-play
- Gizmodo. (2014, February 10). The NSA once banned Furbies as a threat to national security. Gizmodo. https://gizmodo.com/the-nsa-once-banned-furbies-as-a-threat-to-national-sec-1526908210
- Hackaday. (2024, January 25). The NSA’s Furby artificial intelligence scare: FOIA documents provide insight. Hackaday. https://hackaday.com/2024/01/25/the-nsas-furby-artificial-intelligence-scare-foia-documents-provide-insight
- Klepper, D. (1999, April 26). Next they’ll ban rubber duckies. Wired. https://www.wired.com/1999/04/next-theyll-ban-rubber-duckies
- LiveNowFox. (2024, December 13). A brief history of Furby. LiveNowFox. https://www.livenowfox.com/news/furby-history-iconic-toy
Additional Reading
- McStay, A. (2021). Emotional artificial intelligence in children’s toys and devices. SAGE Journals. https://doi.org/10.1177/20539517211025580
Explores how emotional AI is designed and marketed for children, and the cultural and ethical questions this raises. - Chu, G., Apthorpe, N., & Feamster, N. (2018). Security and privacy analyses of Internet of Things children’s toys. arXiv. https://arxiv.org/abs/1805.09042
Technical evaluation of vulnerabilities in connected toys, including Furby Connect. - Forbes, A. (2021). Furby, Siri, and sociable electronics: Understanding emotional connections to machines. UMass ScholarWorks. https://scholarworks.umass.edu/masters_theses_2/1057
Academic exploration of how humans project emotion onto interactive tech. - Darling, K. (2017). The new breed: What our history with animals reveals about our future with robots. Henry Holt.
Insightful look at human–robot relationships, applicable to toys like Furby. - Which? (2017, December 14). Safety alert: How easy it is for hackers to manipulate your child’s toys. https://www.which.co.uk/news/article/safety-alert-how-easy-it-is-for-hackers-to-manipulate-your-childs-toys-aQ5tE1z8kPQk
Consumer advocacy report on connected toy security risks.
Additional Resources
- Hasbro – Official Furby Page
https://furby.hasbro.com
Official product information, features, and brand history. - Global Toy News
https://globaltoynews.com
Industry insights, trends, and expert commentary on toys and play innovation. - MIT Media Lab – Personal Robots Group
https://www.media.mit.edu/groups/personal-robots/overview/
Research into socially intelligent robots and human–machine interaction. - SAGE Journals – AI & Play Research Collection
https://journals.sagepub.com
Peer-reviewed research on AI in children’s play and education. - arXiv – Smart Toy Security Research
https://arxiv.org
Open-access research papers on security and privacy of connected devices.
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