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AI-Powered Captioning and Interpretation for Meetings

Accessibility · Translation & Language Access

What it collects that can identify you

Biometric
Identifiable data
  • Live voice audio captured from meeting participants. Spoken words are processed by the AI for transcription and interpretation purposes.
Run by
Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC)
Where
No fixed location
Kept
Not stated by the Helpful Places.
Shared with
Accountable organization, Vendor

What it is for

AccessibilityTranslation & Language Access

Kudo AI provides automated closed captioning and simultaneous interpretation services to Government of Canada employees during meetings and events. The system processes spoken audio in real time and produces text captions or interpreted speech in other languages. Users should be aware that automated captions and interpretations may contain errors and that a third-party vendor, Kudo, operates the underlying platform.

What it collects and what happens to it

Data taken in

Biometric
Identifiable data
  • Live voice audio captured from meeting participants. Spoken words are processed by the AI for transcription and interpretation purposes.

Processing

Speech & Audio
  • Core processing technique: real-time speech-to-text transcription for closed captioning, and speech-to-speech or speech-to-text for simultaneous interpretation across languages.

What it does

Sensing (Perceptive AI)
Autonomous
  • Processes live audio speech from meeting participants, converting spoken words into structured text captions and interpreted audio output in real time without per-utterance human review.
Creating (Generative AI)
Autonomous
  • Generates real-time text captions and interpreted speech output from spoken audio, producing new content not present in the original input stream.

Outputs

Generated content
Anonymized data
  • Closed captions (text) and interpreted speech or text rendered in real time for meeting participants. The output captures the substance of spoken remarks and may include speaker-identifying context.

Run by

Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC)
  • Federal government agency that deploys Kudo AI to provide closed captioning and simultaneous interpretation services to its employees.

Government of Canada AI Register — Kudo AI (2526-SSHRC-CRSH-003)

Built by

Kudo
  • Third-party vendor that builds and operates the Kudo AI platform for closed captioning and simultaneous interpretation.

Government of Canada AI Register — Kudo AI (2526-SSHRC-CRSH-003)

Kept for

Not stated by the Helpful Places.

Shared with

Available to the accountable organization
  • Captioning and interpretation output is available to the SSHRC as the deploying organization. The extent to which session transcripts are retained and accessible to the organization is not specified in the register entry.
Available to vendor
  • Kudo, as the third-party vendor operating the platform, may have access to audio and caption data processed through its system. The scope of vendor data access is not detailed in the register entry.

Stored

Not stated by the Helpful Places.

How to read the colours

Can it identify you?

Anonymized data
Data about people with the link to who is broken. Stripped of identifiers, blurred, aggregated, or noised so this system can’t reasonably tie a record back to an individual.
Pseudonymous data
Each person’s data is tied to a token (hash, ID, template) that lets this system recognise the same person across events, but the token itself doesn’t reveal a name. Reidentification is possible with extra information.
Identifiable data
The data either contains a direct identifier (name, address, account name, recognisable face or voice, plate number) or carries a token this system uses to look up legal identity during processing.

Who completes the loop?

Human decides
This mode suggests; a person decides what to do next. The AI is always advisory — a human is in the loop on every decision. Example: a triage tool ranks cases for a clinician who chooses which to see first.
Human executes
This mode decides; a person carries out the result. Example: an optimizer plans the day’s trash-collection routes, and drivers run them.
Autonomous
This mode decides and acts on its own. No person reviews each decision or carries out the resulting action.

Definitions from the DTPR standard. Amber is about your data, violet about who decides. The fuller the shape and the deeper the colour, the more identifying the data or the less a person is involved.

What you can do

Ask about this system

Questions go to the Helpful Places, not the vendor.

Your rights

  • Right to Be Informed of AI UseGC employees using meeting platforms where Kudo AI is active should be informed that automated AI captioning and interpretation is in use. Contact the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada for further information about this system.
  • Right to Algorithmic TransparencyGC employees have the right to understand that this system uses AI to generate captions and interpretations automatically. The system is operated by SSHRC through a third-party vendor (Kudo). Contact SSHRC for information about how the system works.

Risks and safeguards

  • Societal & cultural harmAutomated captioning and interpretation systems can produce errors, particularly for accented speech, technical terminology, and minority languages, potentially causing miscommunication or exclusion. Mitigation includes making human interpreters and manual correction available, ensuring users understand the AI-generated nature of captions, and not relying solely on automated output for high-stakes communications.