Customers of ING Direct may soon be able to ask their "digital assistant" to check their bank balance, or tell a "chatbot" on Twitter to freeze a credit card that has gone missing.

As banks grapple with the mobile revolution, the online bank is preparing for what some in the technology world think could be an even bigger change: the rise of artificial intelligence.

By the end of this year, it expects to be capable of unleashing chatbots on Twitter, Facebook, and Google's Assistant, which is the tech giant's answer to Apple's digital assistant, Siri.

While many banks are active on social media, and other Australian banks are also working with chatbots, ING says its new wave of bots are different because they will be able to talk to customers in in everyday, jargon-free language.

Recently appointed chief information officer, Ani Paul, said customers would be able to ask the chatbot questions such as "How much money do I have in my account," or "Am I broke yet?"

In response, the bots will be able to tell them their account balance, or arrange a simple transaction such as moving money between a customer's accounts.

"It's important for us as a bank to be able to talk to our customers in normal, everyday language," Mr Paul said.

The changes are occurring because ING believes more customers will want to interact with their bank via social media or through a digital assistant, rather than through a website, mobile app, or call centre.

While the Dutch-owned ING Direct is known for offering a relatively small range of simple products, and steering clear of gimmicks, Mr Paul said the push towards allowing customers to bank with bots was consistent with the company's philosophy because it was a response to customer activity.

"The ability to converse with customers, that's essentially what we call conversational banking. That's the next tier that we see ourselves going down," Mr Paul said.

Mr Paul expects the bank will be technically capable of rolling out the bots later this year, but no launch date has been set.

Nearly 12 million Australians use social media messaging apps, he said, and overseas banking payments via social media were growing quickly.

These are things which banks are notorious for – not being customer-friendly.

ING's Ani Paul

It has been reported that in the United States, 18 million consumers have made a payment using a digital assistant.

Mr Paul, who was appointed earlier this year, was CIO at ING Vysya Bank (now Kotak Mahindra Bank) in India for almost a decade.

He said banking through social media would use the same security principals as logging into a banking app or website. In some cases it could be more secure, such as when the digital assistants have voice recognition software.

The simplest things for chatbots to deal with are product information, and answering questions that do not require a transaction.

Mr Paul said chatbots could also be used by customers wanting to easily alert the bank when a card has gone missing. In contrast, at the moment a bank might ask a customer to state the card number before they were able to "hotcard" it (freezing transactions on that card).

"These are things which banks are notorious for – not being customer-friendly. We expect our customer at the moment to remember the debit card number that she wishes to hotcard."

Some leaders in technology, such as Google chief executive Sundar Pichai, have predicted the world will move from "mobile-first" to "AI-first," a shift that could have huge ramifications for all manner of businesses, including those in finance.