Google's voice-calling AI could handle your next insurance claim

July 05, 2018

It sounds like Google's scary-natural AI voice calling could wind up in a call center. An unnamed insurance company has shown interest in the tech, according to The Information, where Duplex could "handle simple and repetitive customer calls" before handing things over to a human when the conversation gets more complicated. Surely, no one wants to hear "I don't unde rstand that question, but I'm learning more every day" when you're trying to make a claim, let alone asking for a specific song to play.

While Google quietly removed the "don't do evil" clause from its mission statement, apparently work on this project has moved at a snail's pace due to ethical concerns stemming from Duplex's debut at I/O in May.

Namely, that it wasn't clear if the hair salon or Chinese restaurant employees were aware that they were speaking to a synthesized human voice rather than a warm-blooded homo sapiens. Google later clarified that Duplex would disclose itself as an AI when making calls.

Plenty of call centers are automated at this point, it's just that none of those robo-operators could pass the Turing test; Duplex sounds like it absolutely did. The other side is that this could be another case of computers taking over low-skill jobs that'd typically be done by humans.

As The Information notes, plenty of other companies offer their digital assistants for similar tasks. Amazon, for example, has made its plans to offer commercial versions of Alexa for call centers abundantly clear already. Google makes money hand over fist on its enterprise services as is, and this could be the next step toward boosting its revenues even higher.