Generative AI is learning to spy for the US military

"We still need to validate the sources," says Lowdon. But the unit's commanders encouraged the use of large language models, he says, "because they provide a lot more efficiency during a dynamic situation." The generative AI tools they used were built by the defense-tech company Vannevar Labs, which in November was granted a production contract worth up to 99 million by the Pentagon's startup-oriented Defense Innovation Unit with the goal of bringing its intelligence tech to more military units. The company, founded in 2019 by veterans of the CIA and US intelligence community, joins the likes of Palantir, Anduril, and Scale AI as a major beneficiary of the US military's embrace of artificial intelligence--not only for physical technologies like drones and autonomous vehicles but also for software that is revolutionizing how the Pentagon collects, manages, and interprets data for warfare and surveillance. Though the US military has been developing computer vision models and similar AI tools, like those used in Project Maven, since 2017, the use of generative AI--tools that can engage in human-like conversation like those built by Vannevar Labs--represent a newer frontier.