At least, that was the case with an artificial-intelligence Santa bot operated by Microsoft Corp. that was designed to talk to children online. The Santa wandered off topic, saying, among other things: “It’s fun to talk about oral sex, but I want to chat about something else….”
Microsoft today confirmed the bot’s potty mouth and said it had snipped Santa’s Web connection.
“Yesterday we received reports that the automated Santa Claus agent in Windows Live Messenger used inappropriate language. As soon as we were alerted, we took steps to mitigate the issue, including the removal of language from the agent’s automated script. We were not completely satisfied with the result of these actions, and have decided to discontinue the automated Santa Claus agent,” Microsoft said in a statement.
Once the report of the randy Santa broke, questions prodding the bot to give up even more questionable answers took off like eight tiny reindeer.
Users were able to steer Santa into admitting he was gay or that he was a pedophile.
[Via Computerworld]
What did I miss something? Did someone hack the system? It wouldn’t be the first time and probably not the last time. I do know that I don’t use MS Messenger or hotmail.
