Calltrunk Launches ARGOsearch Phone Search Engine
Privacy issues are raised, when users can search recorded landline, mobile and Skype calls
London-based Calltrunk has launched a phone call search engine that will allow users to search recorded calls for keywords and other important information.
ARGOsearch will be able to search communications made via landlines, smartphone and Skype, with Calltrunk claiming that it will “change the way people think about the spoken word.”
Just like email
Calltrunk currently allows people to record their phone calls on any device, store them in an online “trunk” and access them from anywhere through a smartphone application or via the web. However the addition of ARGOsearch means that they can now be searched in a similar fashion to an email.
“Until now anything even close to this has been the expensive domain of very big companies and it has involved lots of hardware, data centres, complexity and training,” commented Paul Murphy, co-founder and CEO of Calltrunk.
“ARGOsearch changes that completely. This improves and democratizes the technology. Enabling everyone to capture, store and search their recorded calls means we can all hold on to knowledge and important moments that previously slipped through our fingers. And this changes the way we think about our conversations; it’s like having an infallible memory for everything we ever heard or said!”
A beta release of ARGOsearch will be launching immediately in the US, UK and Australia and for the time being will be included in the basic Calltrunk service.
Privacy Concerns
Such a service will inevitably raise privacy and security concerns, especially since not all participants may be aware they are being recorded. Users of Skype are likely to be alarmed that their communications could now be monitored, especially when Skype itself operates on a P2P basis and doesn’t store any of its customers’ communications data.
ARGOsearch could be considered an invasion of privacy at a time when the government is considering forcing ISPs and landline and mobile operators to keep records of calls, texts, emails and visited websites, but not the content of these communications, under new anti-terror laws.
However ARGOsearch is perfectly legal, unlike the Android app sold in China which secretly records mobile phone calls, and if the software struggles as much as Siri to detect strong accents, some users may have nothing to worry about.
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