AI, machine learning, and data science will be used to create some of the most compelling technological advancements of the next decade.  The OODA team will continue to expand our reporting on AI issues. 
Recent OODA analysis on Artificial Intelligence:
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I hear of many projected benefits of Artificial General Intelligence (AGI). But most deal with solving big problems for humanity. Helping national security, helping defeat cancer and other horrible terminal diseases, helping ensure food, transportation, the economy are all optimized are all noble reasons to pursue AGI as fast as possible. 
 
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At the 2024 Worldwide Developers Conference, we introduced Apple Intelligence, a personal intelligence system integrated deeply into iOS 18, iPadOS 18, and macOS Sequoia. Apple Intelligence is comprised of multiple highly-capable generative models that are specialized for our users’ everyday tasks, and can adapt on the fly for their current activity. The foundation models built into… 
 
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The title of this post says it all: you will find here an OODA Loop original analysis of Artificial Intelligence, The Metaverse, Compute, and The Future of Digital Identity Frameworks as part of our Digital Self-Sovereignty Research Initiative.    
 
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The weaponization of cyberspace has been a legitimate concern as nation states aggressively build capabilities to project power, retaliate, and become more offensively minded.  
 
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I’ve professionally tracked geopolitical events for my entire adult life, starting as a Navy Intelligence Officer in 1982. Now at OODA I continue this professional watching of geopolitical events (most of which you see reflected in our reporting). Four decades of experience of operational intelligence analysis leads me to the same conclusion most any watcher… 
 
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The Annual Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community is an unclassified report released each year concurrent with Congressional testimony to Congress by the Director of National Intelligence. The report focuses on what the ODNI believes are the most direct, serious threats to the U.S. during the next year.   OODA leverages the details of this… 
 
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AI Transparency is a concept centered on openness, comprehensibility, and accountability in technological systems. In the context of AI, transparency refers to the extent to which the inner workings and decision-making processes of AI systems are made accessible and understandable to users and other stakeholders. This includes insights into the data training, algorithms employed, and… 
 
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Political Realignment and Regulatory Evolution Pave the Way for Blockchain Innovation in the Nation’s Capital 
 
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A few decades from now, historians might conclude we are living in a Second Gilded Age. In a bit of a repeat of the 1890s, our mid-2020s seems to be an era where technological advancements have triggered fear and uncertainty about what the application of those technologies means for workers, industries, and nations. 
 
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The concept of a digital twin of the Earth’s climate, leveraging geospatial data, climate sensors, and artificial intelligence (AI), presents a transformative potential for our understanding and management of the planet’s climate system. This digital twin, a high-fidelity virtual model of Earth’s climate, could revolutionize our approach to environmental stewardship, disaster response, and climate resilience. … 
 
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A recent headline from Moody’s reads “Convergence of AI and blockchain could recode multiple industries.”  The notion of the “recoding” of an industry sector is compelling – as it suggests a more nuanced, code-level transformation of an industry sector (as opposed to just the disruption that accompanies disintermediation). We explore the nuances of the Moody’s… 
 
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AI versus AI will be the central drama, but the outcome depends profoundly on human choices around how intelligently we govern this technology.  
 
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Our hypothesis on AI Hallucinations is based on a quote from the OODAcon 2024 panel, “The Next Generative AI Surprise: “Artificial Intelligence hallucinations may sometimes provide an output that is a very creative interpretation of something or an edge case that proves useful.” With that framing in mind, the following is the first installment in… 
 
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Other industry sectors should keep a close eye on the critical milestones and pitfalls of the biotech/healthcare space – with an eye toward what platform, product, service innovations, and architectures may have a potable value proposition within your industry. The Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI (HAI) is doing great work fielding research in healthcare with… 
 
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Regular readers of the OODA Loop know that we cover exponential technologies daily and we expect disproportionate disruption when these technologies start to converge.  In this post, we explore AI + an expanded working definition (with subcategories) of what is broadly considered “the metaverse” + blockchain technology as an example of the exponential tech stack… 
 
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Tesla just delivered a software update to my car that is so dramatically different that it is like having a new car. This post provides a bit more on why and extrapolates some lessons relevant to the future of robotics across multiple sectors. The bottom line up front: The best robots give physical form to… 
 
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A report from the Frontier Assessments Unit is a deep dive into hypersonic vehicle research with a very specific framing:  that of the collaborative efforts between U.S. universities and their research affiliations with universities and research organizations in China:  “These vehicles hold the promise of revolutionizing rapid response capabilities, reconnaissance, and even commercial air travel…the… 
 
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Too many times the world has been caught flat-footed by technological advances.  With generative AI there has been ample expectation of its capabilities for both good and bad not to be prepared for what is already materializing. 
 
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According to the Robot Report, The International Federation of Robotics recently “noted that the stock of operational robots around the world attained a new record of about 3.9 million units in 2022. The average robot density, or number of robots per 10,000 human workers, rose to 151 and the trend of using artificial intelligence in robotics and… 
 
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Consistent with our recent analysis of government regulation (or overregulation?) of AI, and the introduction of the concept of the “decontrol” of AI, the recent launch of the AI Safety Institute (organized as a public/private consortium) begs the same questions:  although a public/private collaboration, is the AI Safety Institute an extension of an overall climate… 
 
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In a previous post we asked “Is the US Government Over-Regulating Artificial Intelligence?” We followed it with some historical context and a summary of today’s government controls in “Regulations on Government Use of AI.” This post builds on those two to examine an example on how a decontrol mindset can help speed AI solutions into… 
 
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Is your head still spinning from all the AI news of late? It will all seem so quaint when the useful humanoid robots arrive. 
 
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The year 2024 will require a reorientation to new realities, largely driven by the acceleration of disruptive technologies grinding against the inertia of stale institutions that would rather we snack on the comfort food of the past than the buffet of the future.  In past Almanacs we’ve talked about the rapid acceleration of technology and… 
 
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How can we know if we are over regulated without an overview of the regulatory environment? Here we provide a short overview of the regulation of government IT with an eye towards shedding light on ways to accelerate AI through some decontrol. 
 
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Maybe it is time to start thinking of ways to decontrol our AI. Here are some reasons why. 
 
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An update to our report on what executives need to know about the business impact of biological sciences. 
 
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“When you invent the ship, you also invent the shipwreck; when you invent the plane, you also invent the plane crash” is a seering insight attributed to cultural theorist Paul Virilio  – and is oft quoted here at OODA Loop. We review here some of the new “inventions” that are part and parcel of the emergence… 
 
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The future of AI was a broad theme at OODAcon 2023 which was discussed not only at a session dedicated to the topic, but in the context of the impact of AI on cybersecurity and autonomous systems.  Find those discussions here.  One of the tactical insights from OODAcon 2023 was related to generative AI.  The… 
 
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In this post, we have separated the wheat from the chaff in the AI ecosystem, surfacing and highlighting some of the most prescient AI/ML breakthroughs and promising public/private partnerships.  Companies and organizations featured here include Google DeepMind, The Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence (AI2), The National Science Foundation (NSF), The International Union for Conservation of Nature… 
 
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A former Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) special agent published an article in which he states that misinformation and not tampering with election systems remains the primary threat against U.S. elections. More here. 
 
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The Office of the Secretary of Defense Chief Digital and AI Office (CDAO), Defense Innovation Unit (DIU), U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, U.S. Army Pacific Command and the U.S. Air Force will host a multi-classification hackathon  – BRAVO 11 – open to all U.S. citizens, Feb. 5 – 9, 2024.  Registration is open, details here.  Chief Digital… 
 
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2023 has been marked by what some are characterizing as the double exponential pace of artificial intelligence innovation and commercial deployment.  Following are some of the most prescient developments of the last few weeks. 
 
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As we discussed at OODAcon 2023, historically unprecedented technological disruption is now well underway on an exponentially accelerated timeline.  The challenge now is activating positive outcomes while mitigating risk (ideally, with an eye towards proactive containment of unintended consequences by way of preventative strategies). Grand Challenges and Innovation Accelerators will be central to these global… 
 
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Since the release of ChatGPT in October of last year,  the signal to noise ratio re: solid, credible business strategy resources has been daunting. The Future of Privacy Forum (FPF) is a vetted, sophisticated, and thoughtful resource.  And sometimes checklists are good, even if used only to initiate formative conversations and frame core issues for… 
 
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The year 2023 felt incredibly disruptive and my annual reading list probably reflects that fact as I sought out books that focused not only on managing risk and chaos, but recognizing and fostering disruptive technology opportunties. Five years ago, I recommended Kevin Roberts’ excellent book “64 Shots” which talked about surviving in a VUCA (volatility,… 
 
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A quick survey of academic and commercial developments in the industry sector – healthcare- that remains at the tip of the spear in the hybrid development of applied technologies in AI and Digital Twins.   
 
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Vice News best captured the import of this story: “But there’s one glaring issue: Del Complex is not a real AI company, and its barge is similarly fake.”  Apparently, certain media elements to support the story are AI-generated, including “some of the images on its otherwise convincing-looking website have the hallmarks of being the product of… 
 
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Major global, multinational announcements and events related to AI governance and safety took place last week.  We provide a brief overview here.   In an effort to get off the beaten path, however, and move away from these recent nation-state based AI governance efforts, two recent reports are framing some really interesting isues:  How Might AI… 
 
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The Origins Story and the Future Now of Generative AI – The fast moving impacts and exponential capabilities of generative artificial intelligence over the course of just one year.  
 
 
 
OODA Loop Analysis
The Executive’s Guide To Artificial Intelligence: What you need to know about what really works and what comes next – The megatrend of Artificial Intelligence is transforming the algorithms of business in exciting ways.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman Testifies on “Oversight of A.I.: Rules for Artificial Intelligence”  – Fast on the heels of his May 4th  meeting at the White House with Vice President Kamala Harris and other top administration officials to discuss responsible AI innovation,  OpenAI CEO Sam Altman
NIST Makes Available the Voluntary Artificial Intelligence Risk Management Framework (AI RMF 1.0) and the AI RMF Playbook – NIST’s Artificial Intelligence Risk Management Framework (AI RMF 1.0) “The U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has released its Artificial Intelligence
Using Artificial Intelligence For Competitive Advantage in Business – AI technologies are making continuous advances in domains like industrial robotics, logistics, speech recognition and translation, banking, medicine and advanced scientific research. But in almost every case, the cutting edge AI that drives the advances drops from attention, becoming almost invisible when it becomes part of the overall system.
The Future of Enterprise Artificial Intelligence – A short overview of the business aspects of AI focused on informing decisions including due diligence. 
Opportunities for Advantage: Measuring Trends in Artificial Intelligence – A summary post of major trends.
AI Security: Four Things to Focus on Right Now – This is the only security framework we have seen that helps prevent AI issues before they develop
When Artificial Intelligence Goes Wrong – By studying issues we can help mitigate them
The Future of AI Policy is Largely Unwritten – Congressman Will Hurd provides insight on the emerging technologies of AI and Machine Learning.
AI Will Test American Values In The Battlefield – How will military leaders deal with AI that may treat troops as expendable assets to win the “game”.
The AI Capabilities DoD Says They Need The Most – Savvy businesses will pay attention to what this major customer wants.
What Leaders Need to Know About the State of Natural Language Processing – Major improvements in the ability of computers to understand what humans write, say and search are being fielded. These improvements are significant, and will end up changing just about every industry in the world. But at this point they are getting little notice outside a narrow segment of experts.
NATO and US DoD AI Strategies Align with over 80 International Declarations on AI Ethics – NATO’s release in October of its first-ever strategy for artificial intelligence is primarily concerned with the impact AI will have on the NATO core commitments of collective defense, crisis management, and cooperative security. Worth a deeper dive is a framework within the overall NATO AI Strategy, which mirrors that of the DoD Joint Artificial Intelligence Center’s (JAIC) efforts to establish norms around AI:   “NATO establishes standards of responsible use of AI technologies, in accordance with international law and NATO’s values.” At the center of the NATO AI strategy are the following six principles: Lawfulness, Responsibility and Accountability, Explainability and Traceability, Reliability, Governability, and Bias Mitigation.”
“AI Accidents” framework from the Georgetown University CSET – The Center for Security and Emerging Technology) (CSET)  in a July 2021 policy brief, “AI Accidents:  An Emerging Threat – What Could Happen and What to Do,” makes a noteworthy contribution to current efforts by governmental entities, industry, AI think tanks and academia to  “name and frame” the critical issues surrounding AI risk probability and impact.  For the current enterprise, as we pointed out as early as 2019 in Securing AI – Four Areas to Focus on Right Now, the fact still remains that “having a robust AI security strategy is a precursor that positions the enterprise to address these critical AI issues.”   In addition, enterprises which have adopted and deployed AI systems also need to commit to the systematic logging and analysis of AI-related accidents and incidents.
DHS Science and Technology Directorate (S&T) releases Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) Strategic Plan Amidst Flurry of USG-wide AI/ML RFIs – An artificial intelligence security strategy (see “Securing AI – Four Areas to Focus on Right Now”) should be the cornerstone of any AI and machine learning (ML) efforts within your enterprise.  We also recently outlined the need for enterprises to further operationalize the logging and analysis of artificial intelligence (AI) related accidents and incidents based on an “AI Accidents” framework from the Georgetown University CSET. The best analysis is a sophisticated body of work on AI-related issues of morality, ethics, fairness, explainable and interpretable AI, bias, privacy, adversarial behaviors, trust, fairness, evaluation, testing and compliance.
AI-Based Ambient Intelligence Innovation in Healthcare and the Future of Public Safety –  Disaster conditions will clearly be more impactful and more frequent due to the impact of climate change. The domestic terrorism threat stateside is becoming a constant, with the impact and frequency of growing domestic U.S. political instability and public safety incidents to be determined. We will need systems that are monitoring these temporal, ephemeral ecosystems and providing insights and recommendations for real-time decision-making support and situational awareness analysis. What can AI-Based Ambient Intelligence Innovation in Healthcare teach us?
The Future of War, Information, AI Systems and Intelligence Analysis – The U.S. is in a struggle to maintain its dominance in air, land, sea, space, and cyberspace over countries with capabilities increasingly on par in all domains with that of the U.S.  In addition, information (in all its forms) is the center of gravity of a broad set of challenges faced by the United States. Information, then, is the clear strategic vector of value creation for the emergence of applied technologies to enable operational innovation. For the U.S., the desired outcome is continued dominance for another American Century.  For the Chinese, military capabilities usher in the dawn of a new technological superiority and, as a result, geopolitical and military dominance on the world stage.
Katharina McFarland on Winning in the Age of Artificial Intelligence – Katharina McFarland has led change in a wide array of national security domains including Space, Missile Defense, Acquisition and Nuclear Posture. She is a former Assistant Secretary of Defense