> The current rise of "bots" that I'm seeing being developed of late seems to forget one really crucial thing about humans, especially in a time of need: We need to talk to another human.

I don't think this is true at all. If the bots were effective problem solvers then there'd be no problem. The issue is not some emotional need for human connection. OP certainly didn't need that - he would have been fine with a bot that correctly identified his email as a security report, forwarded it to the appropriate engineer, and let him know.

The issue is that the bots are completely useless for anything but idiot problems. Frankly, a comparably competent human would be much more frustrating.

The icing on the cake is that engineers cost more than support reps. Sure the bot can "scale" but in a lot of cases I wonder if they are really saving by having a team of engineers who cost so much more than phone agents.