AI orartificial intelligenceis all around us, with the technology picking up significant steam following the emergence of chatbots last year. Google has its own set ofAI tools embedded into Search(albeit in a limited capacity right now), while itsanswer to ChatGPTis also becoming increasingly powerful with new updates. Similarly, social media juggernaut Meta hasn’t been far away from AI and recently announced its own chatbot based on Llama 2, with the company alsodetailing plansto bundle its AI experiences in different forms across WhatsApp, Instagram, and Messenger. We’re now getting our first glimpse at how Meta plans to utilize AI within WhatsApp, which continues to be among the mostpopular messaging appsin the world.
As revealed by WhatsApp beta for Androidv2.23.23.8, the makers of the chat app seemingly plan to leverage artificial intelligence for user support on the app. In its current form, support is limited to preset automated messages for each user query. But based on the screenshot shared byWABetaInfo, WhatsApp support could become more conversational and quick to respond to specific user questions.
This new AI-based chat support window is part of WhatsApp’sContact uspage, wherein users can type their query and get a response. Meta notes that the team will get back to the user in a WhatsApp chat and that “some messages may be generated by AI using a secure service from Meta.” This updated customer support system resembles the existing one (pictured below), barring the mention of the new AI capabilities.
It’s unclear when this updated chat support system will roll out to users outside the beta channel, though we presume it shouldn’t take long, as we’ve seen with a few recent WhatsApp feature additions. More broadly, this signals how Meta could supercharge its products with the use of AI, and we’re certain this won’t be the last of the AI features to make it to WhatsApp.
Meta did say that it plans to include text-based AI experiences on Messenger and WhatsApp, with Instagram also expected to use AI to generate and edit images. The company has yet to roll out AI experiences across these apps on a larger scale, but based on people’s experiences withAI stickers on Messenger, it could be a challenging time for Meta, to say the least.
Speaking of AI stickers, the feature should also inevitably make it to WhatsApp,as revealed by a beta release in August. Aside from the likelihood ofAI getting things wrongor generating an inappropriate image, there are also privacy implications involved with data sharing, especially with a company like Meta, which has asketchy historyon the matter.
