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Chatbots going rogue

A proverb says that it's better to keep your mouth shut and let people think you are stupid than to open your mouth and prove it. Seems it can be the same for chatbots. While the release of a new Chinese AI model last week sent stock markets into a tizzy, a financial chatbot stepped into prove there's a long way to go. Virgin Money has blamed the chatbot mishap on old technology. A Virgin Money customer shared a screenshot where he typed: "I have two ISAs with Virgin Money, how do I merge them?" The bank's customer service tool responded: 'Please don't use words like that. I won't be able to continue our chat if you use this language,' suggesting that it deemed the word 'virgin' inappropriate," the FT reports. "Virgin Money apologised for the mistake in a statement on LinkedIn and added there had been 'more at work than just single word exception'. 'Rest assured, we are working on it,' the bank said. One person familiar with the situation at Virgin Money said the mishap had occurred on one of its oldest chatbots, powered by basic natural language processing and which was not running on its most recently upgraded models." The bank said the bot was 'scheduled for improvement'. Cue images of a hapless robot being lowered into a flaming pit.

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