“If there's a robot in your house, chances are it's a Roomba. But that could be about to change. A new generation of home robots is coming -- adorable, loaded with contemporary artificial intelligence and designed to charm their way into your family.
One of the newest comes from a creator of the Roomba himself, Colin Angle. Soft, furry and about the size of a dog, the robot, called "the Familiar," leverages the magic of AI to form intimate bonds with members of the household, ambling from room to room and logging information about its owners.
Robots come with risks. Any machine capable of connecting to the internet, for example, comes with security concerns.
In a 2009 study, my colleagues at the University of Washington showed that internet-connected household robots can be compromised remotely. More recent research suggests introducing AI only exacerbates vulnerabilities.
The worst a hacked Roomba could do is trip you near the stairs. The Familiar, according to its creator, "is large enough or mobile enough to follow you to the kitchen, or drag you off the couch [to] take a walk." Yikes.
Equally worrying is something far more elemental: the danger of cuteness.
As social roboticist Kate Darling illustrates in her 2021 book, "The New Breed: What Our History With Animals Reveals About Our Future With Robots," it doesn't take much for people to form bonds with anthropomorphic machines.
People already bond with their Roombas -- giving them names, taking them on vacation and hosting Roomba playdates, according to Darling's research. These are just robots designed to clean the floor.
In 1999, Sony released the AIBO robot dog. People loved it; sleek and furless, AIBO sold out over and over. But Sony discontinued the original in 2016 as part of broader cost-cutting measures. Then it discontinued service and repair of AIBO within months.
Owners were devastated. In Japan, AIBO owners held mass funerals in century-old Buddhist temples.
Sony AIBO was just a bellwether. "There is no question many people will have such machines in their homes eventually," Darling told me, "and develop real emotional connections to them."
What if the Familiar falls on hard times? What sort of commitments are in place to support owners as their beloved familiars degrade?
The creators of the Familiar say, by default, the robot will not send data to the cloud, and it will ask for permission to access the internet. But iRobot -- the company Angle led for three decades before he left in 2024 to start the new company building the Familiar -- declared bankruptcy last year after European authorities blocked its acquisition by Amazon.
"These are vulnerability manufacturing machines," said Woodrow Hartzog, a professor of law and computer science at Northeastern University who studies anthropomorphic robots. "Even if we know our companion is just a robot, it doesn't stop us from being manipulated."
Our vulnerability to robots comes in part from the mismatch between what we expect a person or pet to be capable of, and what AI-enabled robots can actually do. The "expectation gap," as it is known, can be unsettling. A robot that looks human but behaves differently is creepy, an effect known as the uncanny valley.
Ultimately, the problem with having any technology in your home -- let alone cute technology -- is that someone else designed and controls it. You come home after a long day at work and there waits your robot companion. Big eyes quivering, he is so excited to share a new update. Now you can buy virtual food with which to feed him!
In fact, you have to.
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Ryan Calo is a law professor and information scientist at the University of Washington.” [1]
1. REVIEW --- House Robots Are Coming. They'll Be Dangerously Cute. --- Adorable machines have a secret advantage when it comes to their human owners. Calo, Ryan. Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y.. 13 June 2026: C5.
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