Last months, I often get called by anonymous phone numbers and many other people with me. Most of the times I do not respond to these phone numbers, but sometimes I am curious and do pick them up. Often it are telemarketers, so I finish the conversation quickly and end up being a little annoyed. Google’s smart assistant might be a solution to this annoying calls. (NOS, 2018)
The Call Screen is a feature for the Google Pixel 3 phone. Simply said, this feature screens your phone call before you answered it. When you receive a call from an anonymous phone number, you can choose to answer the call by the Google assistant. The caller will introduce itself, which will be shown as a transcription made by the Google assistant on your phone. After you read the transcription on your screen, you can decide to pick up, let the system tell you more, write a quick reply or mark the number as spam. (Tillman, 2018)
Google states that the system shall clearly indicate that the caller is in a conversation with the Call Screen feature and not with the real human, the caller was trying to reach. I think that this transparency is very important, because people might feel like they are being fooled when it is not clear if they are talking to a human or to a computer. Furthermore, this new feature raises privacy and security issues, since Call Screen allows Google to record and transcript the phone call. Besides that, it is also the question if this feature is really going to be a solution to reduce spam calls. Telemarketers often use number-spoofing services, whereby they can hide their identity by another phone number. This makes it difficult to mark these phone numbers as spam. (Tillman, 2018)
However, I think that it is a valuable new feature, because it gives more insights in who calls you and provides a convenient way of responding to potential spam calls. Do you think that Call Screens are going to be a solution for spam calls?
References:
NOS (2018). Googles nieuwe telefoon beantwoordt spam telefoontjes. Retrieved 14-10-2018 from https://nos.nl/artikel/2254123-googles-nieuwe-telefoon-beantwoordt-spamtelefoontjes.html
Tillman, M. (2018). What is Google Call Screen and how does it work?. Retrieved 14-10-2018 from https://www.pocket-lint.com/apps/news/google/146018-google-call-screen-how-to-screen-spam-calls-with-google-assistant
