iPad Selling My In-Person Conversations to Advertisers. Something Needs to Be Done.

Be assured that Apple does not collect and sell user or personally identifiable information to third-parties.

While Apple itself will not be the source, some Apps that you use with your iPad and Apple devices may have different approaches to data privacy. Apps that you have downloaded and installed from the Apple App Store should publish their privacy policy; you should, if you look, find a listing of the types of data collected and used by the respective App Developer within the corresponding page in the App Store.

Be aware that online tools and search engines, in particular new AI-based assistive technology, do collect and process your data to target advertising and other content. By example, Google's entire business model is predicated upon learning as much about you, your interest and habits - and the devices that you use - as it can, this data being processed and sold to anyone willing to pay for it.

If you are concerned that the intrusive advertising is due to locally stored cookies, for Safari and Apple Apps you can delete the cookies any associated history from your iPad:

Settings > Apps > Safari > [History & Website Data] Clear History & Website Data

As for other devices or voice-activated assistance that may be in your proximity (e.g. Alexa powered devices), you should always be mindful of the potential implications of being "overheard" by this technology. Some are "always on", collecting and processing information; a trigger phrase may simply activate an interactive response - while at other times the assistant will be listening and potentially sending everything that it "hears" for external precessing.

Unless you are in a controlled environment over which you have total control over devices within it, a good rule of thumb is to never discuss anything sensitive (in particular financial) that you wouldn't wish to be publicly known. Be mindful of anything voice activated; for your iPad and iPhone, Siri can be configured to only be active when a physical button is activated - removing the perceived convenience of touch-less/voice activation, but with consequential improvements in security and privacy of your data.

BayLeQue wrote:

I had looked unsatisfactorily, or would not have posted this. It was either my phone or my neighbor’s iPhone or mother’s Google Pixel. Nothing else is possible. Could it be Android?

There are actually many other possibilities, which is why it is odd that you jumped to the conclusion that it is Apple that is collecting your Voice recordings and is an "egregious breach of privacy and dignity, not to mention a falsification of their promise to not sell voice recordings". Turning off Siri will make no difference in any of these examples, so you are simply going down the wrong path:

• If you have a Facebook account (or any other Social Media), another one of your "friends" which could be your neighbor or mother could search for IQ content on that platform and Facebook harvested that data along with any of their friends to target advertisements to you.
• If you have a Google account, other users searches on their account will also be targeted to you. It just takes a gmail sent to you to provide that link or any comment on a shared service such as YouTube. Don't forget the Google was previously caught reading people emails to target advertisements based on the content. If you do have a Google account, it would not surprise me if they targeted you from the data harvested from the Android phones. I am sure your personal information is in those phones Contacts. Do you have a Google account?
• As for your question about Android listening to your conversations, you may want to look at this recent class action lawsuit.

https://www.googleassistantprivacylitigation.com/

Apple is not listening to you and selling the information gained through your conversations to advertisers. You are going to have to look elsewhere for an explanation. It makes no difference if you have Siri turned on or off, Apple still is not selling your conversation to advertisers.

Yesterday I was talking to some people, in-person and out-loud, about IQ.

I suspect one of those persons. Some sites encourage people to get others to subscribe or participate.