Google's AI assistant will identify itself as a robot when calling up businesses on behalf of human users, the company has confirmed, following accusations that the technology was deceitful and unethical. The feature, called Google Duplex, was demonstrated at the company's I/O developers' conference on Tuesday. It is not yet a finished product, but in the two demos played for the assembled crowd, it still managed to be eerily lifelike as it made bookings at a hair salon and a restaurant. But the demonstrations sparked concern that the company was misleading those on the other end of the conversation into thinking they were dealing with another human, not a machine. The generated voice not only sounds extremely natural, but also inserts lifelike pauses, um-ing and ah-ing, and even responding with a wordless "mmm-hmm" when asked by the salon worker to "give me one second".

Android TV didn't get any stage time at Tuesday's Google I/O keynote, but anyone who wandered into the Android TV tent on the grounds of the Shoreline Amphitheater saw something equally important: The JBL Link Bar. Like every other Android TV device, the Link Bar is not a Made by Google product (by the same token, neither are any of the Smart Displays coming later this year that visualize the Google Assistant experience). Like those smart speakers, however, this soundbar is powered by Google's smarts and savvy, and it could turn a forgotten project into a household name. When I walked into the demo room, I already knew that JBL's Link Bar is several products wrapped up into one: a smart speaker, a soundbar, and a 4K Android TV streaming box. But as the Google rep showed me how it works, it became clear that the Link Bar wasn't just another forgettable device powered by Android TV.

Many people have grown accustomed to talking to their smart devices, asking them to read a text, play a song or set an alarm. But someone else might be secretly talking to them, too. Over the last two years, researchers in China and the United States have begun demonstrating that they can send hidden commands that are undetectable to the human ear to Apple's Siri, Amazon's Alexa and Google's Assistant. Inside university labs, the researchers have been able to secretly activate the artificial intelligence systems on smartphones and smart speakers, making them dial phone numbers or open websites. In the wrong hands, the technology could be used to unlock doors, wire money or buy stuff online -- simply with music playing over the radio.

MOUNTAIN VIEW (CBSMiami) -- Artificial Intelligence (AI) is satisfying human needs we may never have thought possible. Now, Google is using AI to tackle mundane, but necessary tasks like making a hair appointment, bringing AI closer to becoming a true personal assistant. "It brings together all our investments over the years," said Google CEO Sundar Chipai, at the AI Developers Conference. Chipai unveiled Google Duplex to an eager crowd roaring with applause, and demonstrated the new tool making a real call to a hair salon. It is nearly impossible to discern which voice belongs to the human, and which belongs to the bot making the call, complete with natural pauses, inflection and crutches like "uh" and "um."

As someone who recently got a haircut, Google's presentation yesterday at I/O really resonated with me. Finally, a service that can make phone calls on my behalf and negotiate appointment times with hair salons. Google's Duplex technology even uses the word "um" and sometimes misunderstands what people on the phone are talking about. It got me thinking: how close is Google to replacing me altogether? For instance, Google can already write most of my text messages, and now it can help compose for me. Could it write my Verge articles, too?

Watch Google CEO Sundar Pichai make a couple of calls with the Google Assistant at Google I/O 2018.

Following widespread outcry over the ethical dilemmas raised by Google's new Duplex system, which lets AI mimic a human voice to make appointments, Google now says the experimental system will have "disclosure built-in." That seems to mean that whatever eventual shape Duplex takes as a consumer product will involve some type of verbal announcement to the person on the other end that he or she is in fact talking to an AI. News of Google's shift in approach to Duplex's transparency was first reported this afternoon by CNET. Duplex is not yet a working product, and Google CEO Sundar Pichai introduced it onstage on Tuesday at the company's I/O developer conference with only a pre-recorded phone call. That demo showcased how Google Assistant could sound much more lifelike when making use of DeepMind's new WaveNet audio-generation technique and other advances in natural language processing, all of which helps software more realistically replicate human speech patterns.

A series of studies have proven that it's possible to secretly give silent commands to voice assistants like Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant without their owners ever knowing. According to the New York Times, researchers in both China and the U.S. have carried out a series of experiments which ultimately proved that it's possible to communicate silent commands that are undetectable to the human ear to voice assistants like Siri, Alexa and Google Assistant. The findings call to light a variety of security concerns as they reveal just how vulnerable voice assistant data could be. In one study conducted by Georgetown University and University of California, Berkeley in 2016, student researchers successfully hid secret voice commands with the help of white noise. The students were able to get smart devices to switch over to airplane mode and navigate to websites by hiding commands to do so in white noise that way played through YouTube videos and loudspeakers.

Google is working on some nifty new features for Google Maps, including a short list of your favorite places, the possibility of a'virtual positioning system' and more. Assistant is coming to Google Maps in a big way, with a ton of new shortcuts, as well as the ability for the digital assistant to text your friend when you're on your way. Google is rolling out a tool called'Your Match', which uses machine learning to determine your location and interests, serving up targeted suggestions for new businesses opening up in your area and more.

Will we demand to know when we're speaking with a bot? Or will we accept that we'll wind up unwittingly conversing with algorithms? Or do we see them merely as tools, unworthy of the values that bind civil society together? These are questions ethicists, developers and designers are puzzling over. How we respond could have far reaching implications for how humans ultimately treat each other.