Microsoft Patent Shows Plans To Revive Dead Loved Ones As Chatbots

Microsoft has been granted a patent that would allow the company to make a chatbot using the personal information of deceased people. The Independent reports: The patent describes creating a bot based on the 'images, voice data, social media posts, electronic messages,' and more personal information. 'The specific person [who the chat bot represents] may correspond to a past or present entity (or a version thereof), such as a friend, a relative, an acquaintance, a celebrity, a fictional character, a historical figure, a random entity etc,' it goes on to say.

'The specific person may also correspond to oneself (e.g., the user creating/training the chat bot),' Microsoft also describes -- implying that living users could train a digital replacement in the event of their death. Microsoft has even included the notion of 2D or 3D models of specific people being generated via images and depth information, or video data.

The idea that you would be able, in the future, to speak to a simulation of someone who has passed on is not new. It is famously the plot of the Black Mirror episode 'Be Right Back,' where a young woman uses a service to scrape data from her deceased partner to create a chatbot -- and eventually a robot.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.