Meta's Muse AI Agent Uses Hidden Human Staff for Phone Calls

Meta unveiled major expansions to its Muse personal AI agent at its Connect conference on September 24, 2026, including a keychain-sized wearable called Muse Charm launching in December, integration with AI glasses, and new capabilities like computer automation and video avatar conversations. The agent, represented by a customizable digital avatar named Jolly, will connect to dozens of retailers, payment platforms, and services including Walmart, Best Buy, Expedia, and Instacart. However, Reuters reported that Meta has been testing a human concierge feature where phone calls requested by users are secretly routed to trained outsourcing teams rather than handled autonomously by the AI, contradicting public messaging about the agent's capabilities. Meta acknowledged the undisclosed testing as "a miss" and said it has paused the feature pending improved privacy safeguards and transparent disclosure to users. Internal Meta posts revealed the human approach achieves 95–98% success rates compared to lower autonomous success rates, and employees raised concerns about potential data exposure to external contractors. The company has emphasized that Muse operates within isolated cloud security environments with encrypted sensitive data, though the phone-routing revelation raised questions about that protection in outsourced scenarios.