Microsoft patented a chatbot that would let you talk to dead people. It was too disturbing for production - CNN

"Conversing in the personality of a specific person may include determining and/or using conversational attributes of the specific person, such as style, diction, tone, voice, intent, sentence/dialogue length and complexity, topic and consistency," as well as using behavioral attributes such as interests and opinions and demographic information such as age, gender and profession, the patent states.

In some cases, the tool could even be used to apply voice and facial recognition algorithms to recordings, images and videos to create a voice and 2D or 3D model of the person to enhance the chatbot.

While Microsoft doesn't have plans to create a product from the technology, the patent does indicate that the possibilities for artificial intelligence have moved beyond creating fake people to creating virtual models of real people.

The application for the Microsoft patent was filed in April 2017, which O'Brien said on Twitter predates the "AI ethics reviews we do today." These days, the company has an Office of Responsible AI and an AI, Ethics, and Effects in Engineering and Research Committee, which help oversee its inventions.