How artificial intelligence could help spies do their jobs

Consider the job of an intelligence analyst--someone who has to sift through vast amounts of information and figure out the bigger narrative. The raw data this hypothetical analyst looks at could be anything from a report on the ground, to government statements, to items in the local media. The analyst's job--looking at data, synthesizing it in a report--is rich territory for artificial intelligence to help out, according to a new company called Primer. Primer has developed an AI system that's in part intended to augment the job of an intelligence analyst at a spy agency. Intelligence isn't the only field they're working in--their partners include Walmart and a sovereign wealth fund in Singapore--but it's perhaps the most intriguing.