Some Meta employees raised privacy concerns about the arrangement, warning that involving human agents could unintentionally share sensitive information with contractors working in call centres.

Meta said it was testing the feature internally before any potential public release.

“We’re working with merchants to continue improving this potential calling feature, and will only roll it out when it’s ready and with the proper disclosures,” Meta spokesperson Daniel Roberts told Reuters.

Muse’s phone feature allows users to ask the AI agent to call US businesses on their behalf.

It can handle tasks such as booking a haircut, checking whether a product is available in a shop or requesting quotes from contractors.

After completing a call, Muse provides the user with a transcript and summary of the conversation.

Meta began having employees test the phone-calling capability in August, then gradually made the feature available to Muse users after the app’s launch.

But internally, Meta also began testing another layer: humans.

The “human concierge” feature, also called “human agent calls”, allowed Muse to hand a request to a trained human agent who would place the call and complete the task.

Meta enabled the feature for about half of its employees during internal testing. Employees who did not want to participate could opt out.

Some employees questioned what would happen when a call involved sensitive information.