AI Helps South Korea Keep an Eye on Its Seniors

It's another entry in the "AI for good" category: The New York Times' Choe Sang-Hun reports South Korea is aging more rapidly than any other country on Earth, leaving too few doctors and caregivers to serve a population that's more than 20% age 65 and up—and so it's leaning on artificial intelligence to keep tabs on seniors living alone and to slow cognitive decline. One tool, "Talking Buddy," is a subscription AI phone service that calls older residents at scheduled intervals for customized chats that run up to five minutes in length and are meant to ease isolation, spot emergencies, and nudge them toward healthy habits.

It's not flawless, as the Talking Buddy supervisor for Gyeonggi Province tells Choe: "When a senior says, 'I'm so weak I'm ready to die,' it's often a figure of speech, not a crisis. AI can't always tell the difference. We follow up and often find them as cheerful as a lark." Indeed, Choe explains worrisome comments are flagged for social workers, who then consult the transcript and audio file to determine if a call or visit to the senior is necessary. One interesting side note: The bots sound somewhat robotic by design, to make it harder for scammers to pretend to be the service. Still, one 81-year-old calls his bot, which phones each Wednesday at 9am, "better than a human." Read the full piece for more.