Senior US national security officials are scheduled to defend their use and development of artificial intelligence on Tuesday in a classified briefing with senators, amid calls for lawmakers to regulate or even temporarily halt the emerging technology.
(Bloomberg) — Senior US national security officials are scheduled to defend their use and development of artificial intelligence on Tuesday in a classified briefing with senators, amid calls for lawmakers to regulate or even temporarily halt the emerging technology.
Kathleen Hicks, deputy defense secretary who last week observed AI-enabled US military exercises, is expected to say that congressional support is critical to the Department of Defense’s efforts to adopt AI responsibly, quickly and at sufficient scale, according to a defense official who was briefed on her expected remarks. The official requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the briefing.
Hicks is also expected to frame the Defense Department as an early pioneer in AI-enabled systems dating back 60 years, and say that the DOD is integrating AI into operations with the help of academia and industry. Craig Martell, the Pentagon’s digital and AI chief, is also expected to cite examples of AI’s use, including how algorithms have enabled logistics tracking in Ukraine, according to the official.
The meeting is one of three summer briefings about AI organized by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, a Democrat from New York. They are being held as some critics fear that AI could run wild in “Terminator”-like scenarios and some academics and technologists call for regulation and a temporary halt in its use. Others argue that the Pentagon isn’t moving fast enough to address the perceived AI threat posed by China.
Tuesday’s meeting will focus on how the US is using and investing in AI to protect national security and what US adversaries are doing with the technology, according to a July 9 open letter from Schumer to senators. Hicks is expected to tell the senators that China hasn’t made the same commitments to ensure humans are responsible and accountable for decisions taken by AI as the US.
The US military is experimenting with AI and developing platforms to connect sensors and systems to assist with decision-making and targeting.
It has developed hundreds of AI projects, including Project Maven, which seeks to automatically identify images captured by drones, satellites and other sensors. Thousands of Google workers declined to work on the program after it started in 2017, but several companies work on it today.
The official said the Defense Department doesn’t want to hide US efforts on AI from the public and is proud of the guardrails on usage it has put in place. However, those guardrails stop short of safeguards floated by UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who has advocated a ban on lethal autonomous weapons, and most recently a global AI watchdog agency.
Hicks and Martell will be joined by Avril Haines, director of national intelligence, Arati Prabhakar, director for the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, and Frank “Trey” Whitworth, vice admiral and director of the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency, which now runs Project Maven.
Gregory Allen, a former defense official who is now at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a bipartisan think tank, told Bloomberg the US Defense Department is still playing catchup on efforts to adopt what he said is set to be a transformative technology. Pockets of genuine excellence on AI adoption within the Defense Department “are few and far between,” he said.
–With assistance from Anna Edgerton and Jennifer Jacobs.
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