By Katie Paul
NEW YORK, Sept 22 (Reuters) - Meta has been testing a "human concierge" for its new personal AI assistant, Muse, which entails having human contractors quietly handle some of the phone calls placed via the digital agent, according to internal company posts seen by Reuters. The Facebook and Instagram owner told employees about the test last week, shortly after the company publicly launched a phone calling feature for Muse, one of those posts showed.
Some employees have raised privacy concerns about human agents handling the calls, warning that it could result in sensitive information being shared unintentionally with contractors in call centers.
Asked about the feature, a Meta spokesperson said the response from employees has been "overwhelmingly positive" and that the purpose of the test was to "get feedback so we can implement safety and privacy protections and improve features before we release them publicly."
"We're working with merchants to continue improving this potential calling feature, and will only roll it out when it's ready and with the proper disclosures," said the spokesperson, Daniel Roberts.
(Reporting by Katie Paul in New York, Editing by Kenneth Li and Matthew Lewis)