Sarawak expands voice AI trials for government services

The initial trial, conducted under a memorandum of understanding signed at the Digital Government Exchange 2026, focused exclusively on SAINS internal operations. While the AI successfully processed requests in mixed Bahasa Malaysia and English, the testing revealed significant hurdles regarding Sarawak-specific accents and department-specific acronyms. Benjamin Foong, CEO of 8nabler, noted that the upcoming phase will prioritize these linguistic refinements while expanding language support to include Iban, Mandarin, and Tamil.

Beyond technical accuracy, the partnership is shifting its focus toward the infrastructure of data sovereignty. The next evaluation will determine if AI models and conversation records can be hosted entirely within Sarawak, ensuring that PII masking and audit trails align with the National Digital Department’s guidelines for public sector AI adoption. If successful, the technology could eventually allow citizens to access government information via standard telephone calls, bypassing the need for mobile applications or broadband connectivity. However, both parties maintain that sensitive tasks, such as welfare eligibility, will remain under the purview of human decision-makers.