Alexa to soon mimic voices of loved ones

Amazon shared its vision for companionship with Alexa at the conference

Amazon.com Inc. is planning to give customers the chance to make Alexa, the company's voice assistant, sound like whomever they want. The tech giant is developing a system to enable Alexa to mimic any voice after hearing it for under a minute, said Rohit Prasad, an Amazon senior vice president, at a conference the company held in Las Vegas Wednesday. The work enters into an area of technology that has garnered scrutiny for potential benefits and abuses. For example, Microsoft Corporation recently restricted certain businesses from using its software to mimic voices. The idea is to help people with speech impairments or other challenges, but some worry it could also be used to bring about political deep fakes.

Prasad said Amazon's aim for Alexa is "generalizable intelligence," or the capability to adapt to users' environments and learn new concepts with minimum external information. Amazon shared its vision for companionship with Alexa at the conference. In a video segment, it portrayed a child who asked, "Alexa, can grandma finish reading me the Wizard of Oz?” A moment later, Alexa affirmed the command and changed her voice. She spoke soothingly, less robotically, ostensibly sounding like the individual's grandmother in real life.