Robocalls are plaguing the nation with the unwanted annoyance of regular robot telemarketing phone calls. Year over year this past December, robocalls had nearly doubled from 1.5 billion in December 2015 to 2.3 billion in December 2016. The worst part? The technology behind the calls is evolving. From overlaying local numbers in your area code to creating superimposed background noise with laughter and coughing, robocalls are becoming harder and harder to screen. Although there isn't a way to completely block out all calls, there are a few options including choosing to not interact with them (pressing a number to opt out typically does nothing but confirm it's a working number), adding your number to the National Do Not Call Registry, and/or downloading one of the various applications that work to screen calls before ever connecting to your phone. Most importantly, officials say to avoid using "yes" on any robocall as some have used this "voice signature to authorize fraudulent charges by telephone".
Facebook Robots Make Up Own Language
Facebook chose to shut down two robots this past week after they began to communicate in their own "language" while working through a negotiation role play. They were having the robots "barter" for items such as hats, balls, and books; each of which were assigned a value. Although when looking at the text conversation it doesn't seem to make much sense, the robots continually stressed their own names, seeming to be a part of the negotiations. The robots would even "place interest in one specific item - so that they could pretend they were making a big sacrifice by giving it up."
This isn't the first time artificial intelligence has made up its own language in an effort to improve efficiency - "Google revealed earlier this year that...its Translate tool had created its own language to translate into then out of." In this instance, Google chose to continue to let the AI run, citing it was happy with the development. Seemingly futuristic, one linguist says it's "unlikely the language is a precursor to new human speech" specifically due to its text based foundation rather than spoken.