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An intelligent virtual assistant ( IVA ) or intelligent personal assistant ( IPA ) is a software agent that can perform tasks or services for an individual based on commands or questions. Sometimes the term "chatbot" is used to refer to virtual assistants generally or specifically accessed by online chat. In some cases, online chat programs are exclusively for entertainment purposes. Some virtual assistants are able to interpret human speech and respond via synthesized voices. Users can ask their assistants questions, control home automation devices and media playback via voice, and manage other basic tasks such as email, to-do lists, and calendars with verbal (spoken?) commands. A similar concept, however with differences, lays under the dialogue systems. As of 2017, the capabilities and usage of virtual assistants are expanding rapidly, with new products entering the market and a strong emphasis on both email and voice user interfaces. Apple and Google have large install

Experimental decades: 1910's — 1980's edit Radio Rex was the first voice activated toy released in 1911. It was a dog that would come out of its house when its name is called. In 1952 Bell Labs presented “Audrey”, the Automatic Digit Recognition machine. It occupied a six- foot-high relay rack, consumed substantial power, had streams of cables and exhibited the myriad maintenance problems associated with complex vacuum-tube circuitry. It could recognize the fundamental units of speech, phonemes. It was limited to accurate recognition of digits spoken by designated talkers. It could therefore be used for voice dialing, but in most cases push-button dialing was cheaper and faster, rather than speaking the consecutive digits. Another early tool which was enabled to perform digital speech recognition was the IBM Shoebox voice-activated calculator, presented to the general public during the 1962 Seattle World's Fair after its initial market launch in 1961. This early computer, d

Virtual assistants work via: Text, including: online chat (especially in an instant messaging app or other app), SMS Text, e-mail or other text-based communication channel, for example Conversica's Intelligent Virtual Assistants for business. Voice, for example with Amazon Alexa on the Amazon Echo device, Siri on an iPhone, or Google Assistant on Google-enabled/Android mobile devices By taking and/or uploading images, as in the case of Samsung Bixby on the Samsung Galaxy S8 Some virtual assistants are accessible via multiple methods, such as Google Assistant via chat on the Google Allo and Google Messages app and via voice on Google Home smart speakers. Virtual assistants use natural language processing (NLP) to match user text or voice input to executable commands. Many continually learn using artificial intelligence techniques including machine learning. Some of these assistants like Google Assistant(which contains Google Lens) and Samsung Bixby also have the added ability to

Virtual assistants may be integrated into many types of platforms or, like Amazon Alexa, across several of them: Into devices like smart speakers such as Amazon Echo, Google Home and Apple HomePod In instant messaging apps on both smartphones and via the Web, e.g. Facebook's M (virtual assistant) on both Facebook and Facebook Messenger apps or via the Web Built into a mobile operating system (OS), as are Apple's Siri on iOS devices and BlackBerry Assistant on BlackBerry 10 devices, or into a desktop OS such as Cortana on Microsoft Windows OS Built into a smartphone independent of the OS, as is Bixby on the Samsung Galaxy S8 and Note 8. Within instant messaging platforms, assistants from specific organizations, such as Aeromexico's Aerobot on Facebook Messenger or Wechat Secretary on WeChat Within mobile apps from specific companies and other organizations, such as Dom from Domino's Pizza In appliances, cars, and wearable technology. Previous generations of virtua

Virtual assistants can provide a wide variety of services. These include: Provide information such as weather, facts from e.g. Wikipedia or IMDb, set an alarm, make to-do lists and shopping lists Play music from streaming services such as Spotify and Pandora; play radio stations; read audiobooks Play videos, TV shows or movies on televisions, streaming from e.g. Netflix Conversational commerce (see below) Assist public interactions with government (see Artificial intelligence in government) Complement and/or replace customer service by humans. One report estimated that an automated online assistant produced a 30% decrease in the work-load for a human-provided call centre. Conversational commerce edit Conversational commerce is e-commerce via various means of messaging, including via voice assistants but also live chat on e-commerce Web sites, live chat on messaging apps such as WeChat, Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp and chatbots on messaging apps or Web sites. Customer Support ed

Virtual assistants have a variety of privacy concerns associated with them. Features such as activation by voice pose a threat, as such features requires the device to always be listening. Modes of privacy such as the virtual security button have been proposed to create a multilayer authentication for virtual assistants.

This section's tone or style may not reflect the encyclopedic tone used on Wikipedia . See Wikipedia's guide to writing better articles for suggestions. ( July 2020 ) (Learn how and when to remove this template message) Google Assistant edit Google Assistant does not store your data without your permission. To store the audio, you can go to Voice & Audio Activity (VAA) and turn on this feature. Your audio files are sent to cloud and used by Google to improve the performance of Google Assistant, but only if you have turned on the VAA feature. Amazon's Alexa edit Amazon’s Virtual Assistant Alexa only listens to your conversation when you use its wake word (like Alexa, Amazon, Echo). It starts recording the conversation after the call of a wake word. It stops listening after 8 seconds of silence. It sends the recorded conversation to the cloud. You can delete your recording from the cloud by visiting ‘Alexa Privacy’ in ‘Alexa’. You can stop Alexa from listening to your

Presumed added value as allowing a new way of interactions edit Added value of the Virtual Assistants can come among others from the following : Voice communication can sometimes represent the optimal man-machine communication : It is convenient: there are some sectors where voice is the only way of possible communication, and more generally, it allows to free-up both hands and vision potentially for doing another activity in parallel, or helps also disabled people. It is faster: Voice is more efficient than writing on a keyboard: we can speak up to 200 words per minute opposed to 60 in case of writing on a keyboard. It is also more natural thus requiring less effort (reading a text however can reach 700 words per minute). Virtual Assistants save a lot of time by automation: they can take appointments, or read the news while the consumer does something else. It is also possible to ask the Virtual Assistant to schedule meetings, hence helping to organize time. The designers of new digi

Artificial Intelligence controversies edit Virtual Assistants spur the filter bubble: As for social media, Virtual Assistants’ algorithms are trained to show pertinent data and discard others based on previous activities of the consumer: The pertinent data is the one which will interest or please the consumer. As a result, they become isolated from data that disagrees with their viewpoints, effectively isolating them into their own intellectual bubble, and reinforcing their opinions. This phenomena was known to reinforce fake news and echo chambers. Virtual Assistants are also sometimes criticized for being overrated. In particular, A. Casilli points out that the AI of Virtual Assistants are neither intelligent nor artificial for two reasons : Not intelligent because all they do is being the assistant of the human, and only by doing tasks that a human could do easily, and in a very limited specter of actions: find, class, and present information, offers or documents. Also, Virtual Ass

Notable developer platforms for virtual assistants include: Amazon Lex was opened to developers in April 2017. It involves natural language understanding technology combined with automatic speech recognition and had been introduced in November 2016. Google provides the Actions on Google and Dialogflow platforms for developers to create "Actions" for Google Assistant Apple provides SiriKit for developers to create extensions for Siri IBM's Watson, while sometimes spoken of as a virtual assistant is in fact an entire artificial intelligence platform and community powering some virtual assistants, chatbots. and many other types of solutions. Previous generations edit In previous generations of text chat-based virtual assistants, the assistant was often represented by an avatar (a.k.a. interactive online character or automated character ) — this was known as an embodied agent.

Intelligent personal assistant Developer Free software Free and open-source hardware HDMI out External I/O IOT Chromecast integration Smart phone app Always on Unit to unit voice channel Skill language Alexa (a.k.a. Echo) Amazon.com No No No No Yes No Yes Yes ? ? Alice Yandex No N/A N/A N/A Yes No Yes Yes N/A ? AliGenie Alibaba Group No No N/A N/A Yes No Yes Yes N/A ? Assistant Speaktoit No N/A N/A N/A No No Yes No N/A ? Bixby Samsung Electronics No N/A N/A N/A No No Yes N/A N/A ? BlackBerry Assistant BlackBerry Limited No N/A N/A N/A No No Yes No N/A ? Braina Brainasoft No N/A N/A N/A No No Yes No N/A ? Clova Naver Corporation No N/A N/A N/A Yes No Yes Yes N/A ? Cortana Microsoft No N/A N/A N/A Yes No Yes Yes N/A ? Duer Baidu Evi Amazon.com True Knowledge No N/A N/A N/A No No Yes No N/A ? Google Assistant Google No N/A

For individuals edit Digital experiences enabled by virtual assistants are considered to be among the major recent technological advances and most promising consumer trends. Experts claim that digital experiences will achieve a status-weight comparable to ‘real’ experiences, if not become more sought-after and prized. The trend is verified by a high number of frequent users and the substantial growth of worldwide user numbers of virtual digital assistants. In mid-2017, the number of frequent users of digital virtual assistants is estimated to be around 1 bn worldwide. In addition, it can be observed that virtual digital assistant technology is no longer restricted to smartphone applications, but present across many industry sectors (incl. automotive, telecommunications, retail, healthcare and education). In response to the significant R&D expenses of firms across all sectors and an increasing implementation of mobile devices, the market for speech recognition technology is predicte

In May 2018, researchers from the University of California, Berkeley, published a paper that showed audio commands undetectable for the human ear could be directly embedded into music or spoken text, thereby manipulating virtual assistants into performing certain actions without the user taking note of it. The researchers made small changes to audio files, which cancelled out the sound patterns that speech recognition systems are meant to detect. These were replaced with sounds that would be interpreted differently by the system and command it to dial phone numbers, open websites or even transfer money. The possibility of this has been known since 2016, and affects devices from Apple, Amazon and Google. In addition to unintentional actions and voice recording, another security and privacy risk associated with intelligent virtual assistants is malicious voice commands: An attacker who impersonates a user and issues malicious voice commands to, for example, unlock a smart door to gain un