The Air Force Bought a Surveillance-Focused AI Chatbot

The U.S. Air Force paid for a test version of an AI-powered chatbot to assist in intelligence and surveillance tasks as part of a $1.2 million deal, according to internal Air Force documents obtained by 404 Media. From the report: The news provides more insight into what military agencies are currently exploring using AI for, and comes as more AI companies eye the military space as a business opportunity. OpenAI, for instance, quietly removed language that expressly prohibited its technology for military purposes in January. "Edge Al Platform for Space and Unmanned Aerial Imagery Intelligence," a section of one of the documents reads. The contract is between the Air Force and a company called Misram LLC, which also operates under the name Spectronn. Included in a "milestone schedule" explaining the specifics of the deal are the items "ISR chatbot design" and "ISR chatbot software." ISR refers to intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, a common military term. Other items in the schedule include "data ingestion tool" and "data visualization tool." 404 Media obtained the documents through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request with the Air Force. On its website, Spectronn advertises an "AI Digital Assistant for Analytics." It says the bot can take data such as images and videos, and then answer plain English questions about that information. "Current analytics dashboard solutions are complex and not human-friendly. It leads to severe latency (from hours to days), cognitive load on the data analyst, false alarms, and frustrated decision makers or end-users," it reads.

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