Google presents Live Relay, a tool that allows you to answer calls to people who can not hear or speak

As it did in the opening speech of the Google I / O 2018, Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google, again insisted yesterday, during the keynote of Google I / O 2019, on the importance of guaranteeing the accessibility of technology with the In order to make life easier for all those who have some kind of disability.

So, just as last year announced Lookout and a few months ago presented Live Transcribe and Sound Amplifier, Google is now working on Live Relay, a tool designed for anyone who can not speak or listen if they are able to meet a call.

Listen and speak for you

According to Sapir Caduri, software engineer and developer of Live Relay, the idea for the project came when, last year, he read that a deaf man could not fix the Internet connection in his house because the technical service had no way of communicating with him through text messages, email or chat, only through a call.

In order to help people make and receive phone calls without having to talk or listen , Live Relay uses mobile voice recognition and text-to-speech conversion to allow the phone to listen and speak in place of users. while they write.

As it offers Smart Responses and predictive writing suggestions (Smart Compose), it is possible to write fast enough to keep a fluent phone call. In addition, Live Relay runs completely on the device, so the privacy of the conversation is maintained , and as it interacts through a regular telephone call (which does not require data), the person on the other side may be speaking perfectly from a landline.

Thanks to the Smart Responses and the suggestions of predictive writing (Smart Compose), it is possible to write fast enough to keep a fluent phone call

Google states that Live Relay is intended to be used by anyone who can not speak or listen during a call, but is especially useful in deaf or hard of hearing users . In this sense, the company states that it does not intend to replace other real-time text transmission services (RTT) that already exist, for example, in the United States, but want to complement them with Live Relay.

Although it is still under investigation, Sapir Caduri says they are exploring the integration of translation in real time so that we can call anyone in the world and communicate with them regardless of language barriers. We do not know if, finally, we will see the project materialized, but there is no doubt that Google is striving to offer more and better ways of communicating, especially to those who have difficulty doing so with current solutions.