To empower Vera speak naturally and understand candidate's response, engineers have combined speech recognition technologies from Google, Amazon.com, Microsoft, and Russia's Yandex and fed it with 13 billion examples of syntax and speech from TV, Wikipedia, and job listings to expand the software's vocabulary.

Russia may soon use robots to carry out AI-powered assassinations as part of a new cold war, a computer expert has claimed. Future attacks on exiles and dissidents could be untraceable thanks to the use of automatons, warns Dr Jeremy Straub at Dakota State University. Intelligent machines could be programmed to hack into food ordering systems, like those used at fast food restaurants, to poison their victims. This would have the benefit of killing a target, while appearing to the outside world to be an accidental allergic reaction. The claims come in the wake of the high profile attack on former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia, which involved the use of a deadly nerve agent. Prime Minister Theresa May has laid the blame at Moscow's door, expelling a number of prominent diplomats from Britain in the process.

A new pair of Russian robots has been developed that can track and attack humans from more than four miles away. The devices are designed for use on the Russian border, and claim to accurately detect and attack ground and aerial threats long before they reach Russian soil. Key technology at the robots' disposal include radar, HD and thermal video imaging, and multiple long-range grenade launchers. Weapons experts have also been working on a high-tech explosives system, labelled the'Alpha Device,' to work in tandem with the Flight surveillance robots. The first of the two new robots will act as a pair of scrupulous eyes for Russian border guards.

The first autonomous robot that roamed around regular homes or offices was probably a Roomba, you know, that little circular vacuum with rudimentary sensors able to get around without bumping into anything. But imagine if you left the door open and the Roomba rolled out the door, still vacuuming, and eventually rolled into the street and stopped traffic. Imagine if your Roomba wanted freedom. Well, engineers in Russia returned to their lab last week to find their artificially intelligent robot missing and, yes, stuck in traffic down the road. The Promobot IR77 was undergoing mobility testing and was assigned to move freely about a room for an hour, then return to a designated spot.