SYSTEM DEVELOPMENT
Evolving Artificial Intelligence Continues to Challenge Defense Strategies By John Reardon, Publisher
Intelligence resources of all kinds contribute to changing landscape of defense.
The future is opening an array of ideas that are melding the use of Artificial Intelligence with defense in ways that challenge classical norms. The future will take advantage and make use of more publicly available open-source data to create a battle plan that is more efficient and less predictable. The fire hose of incoming data is changing the traditional practices employed and creating new opportunities. As threats are no longer constrained by geography, the internet has enabled attacks through cyberspace. Protected borders and geography have provided the United States with security in the past, but as we become more connected this is no longer the case. Today we can be attacked without a shot being fired from known and unknown advisories. The use of power is not what it used to be. Of course, wars fought with beans and bullets will continue, but the threat has expanded to include a whole other level of infrastructure and civil unrest. The United States
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COTS Journal | August 2021
as a leader in connectivity is both powerful and vulnerable at the same time. This has resulted in defense strategies that we have to understand and anticipate with a whole new array of threats. Beyond this the need to look beyond those that we believe to be our primary advisories, we must look to those that are non-state actors or domestic groups wishing to cause harm. The ability to configure data in helpful data sets continues to challenge the most advanced minds. As open-source information once thought to be ancillary to the primary information from front line sensors, is gaining greater prominence. Today the merge of data from social media and crowdsourcing has contributed significantly to identifying those that attacked the Capitol on January 6th as an example. It is the opinion of many that this trend will continue with many front-line sensors, being validated through the use of back-end data found in non-defense data centers.
