Google's advanced AI-powered Duplex rolled out for select users in the US

Google at its I/O developer's conference showcased its voice booking system Duplex. The feature allows users to make bookings using an AI-powered assistant that will talk to the store, restaurant, or any other place to make reservations on the user's behalf. The feature has now arrived on some Pixel devices in the US.

Google told Venture Beat that a small group of users in select areas in the US. As of now, users will only be able to make restaurant reservations. Users just have to ask Google to make the booking with the name of the place. The command will be followed by a few questions from the assistant such as the number of people and the phone number the user wants to make the reservation under.

Google believes that Duplex will work four out of five times, according to Venture Beat, the feature has worked every single time during their test. The service apparently isn't available with all restaurants. The reason could be due to an issue with the system, or because some places have opted out from supporting bookings through Google Duplex.

A video showed how the company has made few important changes in how it works when compared to the demo that was shown at the time of the launch. Now, the system notifies the receiver that the call is made by the Google Assistant and also tells that the call is being recorded.

If the receiver wishes to not be recorded, Google transfers the call to a non-recorded line. At the time of launch, the demo raised a lot of concerns surrounding the user privacy. Google later promised to put safeguards to avoid the breach of privacy. Users will only be able to cancel one booking a day. If a user cancels too many bookings in a row, they will be banned to use the service any further.

Currently, there's no specific update on when the project will be rolled out to a wider audience. This is the first time something this ambitious has been tried out, so its likely that the feature will soon come to wider number of users.