The Pentagon is spending millions on AI bias detection tools

The U.S. Defense Department has a new office dedicated to advancing the use of AI throughout the military. Now the money from a $249 million blanket purchase agreement is starting to flow to several AI tech providers that also work with enterprises in other industries, including companies like Arthur that help monitor AI models to avoid bias and inaccuracy. Arthur's software tracks performance of AI models including computer vision and natural-language processing models. Arthur is among a burgeoning sector of companies providing software and services for auditing how machine-learning and AI models are built, and monitoring them for problems after they're in use. The company collected $15 million in series A funding in December 2020.