FYI.

This story is over 5 years old.

Design

New Artificially Intelligent Robot Can Steal Your Face And Mimic Your Voice

SociBot-Mini will "become a butler who knows you inside and out." Maybe literally.

In what feels like a mash-up of Steven Spielberg's A.I., Ash from Aliens, and Face Off, a freshly-premiered robot assistant could point to a future of robotics characterized by face-stealing, voice-mimicking personal assistants who can correctly guess your age and change colors on command. Are you excited, too?

Meet SociBot-Mini, a 60-centimeter-tall robot built by Will Jackson and Engineered Arts that has a depth-sensing camera, computer vision software, and speech capabilities, allowing it to recognize strangers, guess moods, and even mimic new faces it encounters. As Jackson told NewScientist (who made a video of the SociBot-Mini in action, above), "It'll become a butler who knows you inside and out." Maybe literally.

Advertisement

While SociBot-Mini is promoted as a next-gen information terminal that people could interact with at retail locations, the robot could also be used for conference calls, education purposes, and even (feasibly) futuristic therapy. This bot can change its face due to its depth-sensing camera, but it can also mimic headshots and photos.

NewScientists notes similar robots, including Furhat, an animatronic bud built by Samer Al Moubayed at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden, which can have 3D-printed faces attached to its mug. "The idea is to take infrared scans of someone's friends and print their faces, so that the appropriate one can be used just before the person calls them," writes Paul Marks. Supposedly, Skype has shown interest in Furhat, meaning the next decade of telepresence could get really… metallic.

These bots are either the most exciting or disquieting innovation we've seen in a while. While it could be great for its novelty factor (fake me guessed our age!), its ability to impersonate makes us have flashbacks to when Ripley incinerated her nefarious crewmate in Ridley Scott's sci-fi classic.

via NewScientist

@zachsokol