Conversation on AI commerce should be music to tech giants' ears

Talk is cheap, but security is king in the AI future of conversational commerce. Researchers at TSSG in Waterford are on the case for making AI voice-based commerce tangible and safe. The speed of the introduction of services like Apple's Siri, Microsoft's Cortana and Amazon Echo's Alexa makes it easy to forget that the artificially intelligent (AI) future we all dreamed of is actually here. Yesterday, Gartner Fellow and vice-president Tom Austin pointed this paradox out when he said that most of the AI on our smartphones – many of which have been with us for years – are taken for granted. 'We are seeing cool apps coming out but we have to make sure that we underpin the technology by addressing core security and privacy concerns as well' – ERIC ROBSON And yet, the hottest areas of tech today, AI and machine-learning, hold the keys to a whole generation of services that will transform our lives forever.