Google Duplex Boon Or Bane?

The tech giant Google on May 8, during its io18 event, announced an update to Google Assistant called Duplex. CEO Sundar Pichai announced that Google Assistant can now make real phone calls and make reservations and appointments.

This might be a breakthrough in the Machine Learning technology we were waiting for. It is an amazing new technology but is the world ready for it just yet? Somewhere between the human touches in speech such as "umm" there was speculation that this might be a really good thing or a scary one. 

Reports suggest that Duplex might have passed the Turing test developed by Alan Turing which tests the ability of a machine to exhibit intelligence indistinguishable from that of a human. 

During the presentation by Google, they showed how it can make a haircut appointment and also a restaurant reservation. The person on the other end while not aware they are talking to a robot and not a human completed the request. Robots are already being used by companies to promote their product over the phone but now even we can use them for our telephonic tasks. There might come a time when even the person answering such services will be a bot and both the assistant will complete the tasks themselves without human interference. 

But is Google obliged to tell us that we are talking to a virtual assistant instead of a real person? Will we still be talking if we know that a robot is at the other end or will we just hang up? Because as soon as we know that there is robocaller on the phone our instinct is to hang up due to the risk of being exposed to scams and hackers.

There are lots of speculations and debates about whether this is a good thing or not but the ultimate decision remains in the hands of the everyday consumer on whether to accept it and implement in their daily lives or not.