Welcome to Carpe Datum’s weekly newsletter, the Federal Data Prospector, the only publication of its kind dedicated exclusively to data and analytics companies that share our passion for serving the public sector. Our featured items begin with the FBI's search for open-source and publicly available facial recognition (FR) technologies and supporting data. Specifically, the FBI is interested in facial recognition algorithms that leverage open-source image repositories, with an emphasis on SaaS capabilities to support law enforcement investigations.
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Department of Justice, Federal Bureau of Investigation — FBI BSS Facial Recognition Technology - Responses to this RFI are intended to identify capable parties who (1) conduct ongoing collection of open-source and publicly available images and (2) offer a face recognition (FR) capability to customers enabling them to search their face images against the collected open-source and publicly available images and receive a list of highest probably match candidates. FR technology (FRT) has become more commercialized in recent years and the FBI would like to have a better understanding of which companies are actively part of this industry.
In other data news, on September 18th , DefenseScoop published an article entitled CDAO unveils new 10-year, $15B Advana recompete plan — but questions on implementation linger. In this story, Brandi Vincent details the Pentagon Chief Digital and AI Office's (CDAO) plans to allocate an additional $15 billion towards the DoD's Advana data and analytics program. Despite the ambitious plan, uncertainties persist around the acquisition process, vendor participation, and how the evolving platform will adapt to future needs.
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“The word Advana is a mash-up of two others — 'Advancing Analytics' — a phrase meant to encompass the Chief Digital and AI Office’s original intent for effort. Broadly, Advana is a technology platform that houses government-owned data in a flexible federated architecture that enables analytics, data management and data science tools, and associated decision-making support services for the department and military components.”
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The Carpe Datum Team
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World Fleet Register Data for USACE Waterborne Commerce Statistics Center
Dept. of Defense
| Part of the information essential to waterway system evaluations includes the identity and specifications of vessels including vessel type, physical dimensions, capacities, and other characteristics, including (but not necessarily limited to) age, powering and immersion. IWR-WCSC employs this data and information to help verify the identity of vessels with linkage of vessel and trade tonnage movements to develop a more complete profile of trade statistics used for decision-making and evaluations of waterway system projects. | |
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Biometric Identity Research and Development (BIRD)
Dept. of Homeland Security
| As a program within the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the Office of Biometric Identity Management (OBIM) supports DHS’s mission to protect our nation by providing biometric and biographic identification services to federal, state, and local government decision makers to help them accurately identify the people they encounter and determine whether those people pose a risk to the United States. | |
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Waterborne Trade & Deep-Draft Vessel Service Data & Info Incorporating GeographicAIS Tracking of Vessel Movements for Waterborne Transport Services Serving the US to Inform Economic & Engineering Evaluations of Waterways Under USACE Stewardship
Dept. of Defense
| IWR (IWR-WRC and IWR-WCSC) have identified technical requirements for the acquisition of maritime-related data and information regarding vessel movements and patterns of vessel service combined with supporting information pertaining to vessel specifications, ports and respective cargo handling facilities and infrastructure (docks or berthing, etc.). | |
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Batch Location Services
Dept. of Veterans Affairs
| A key part of operations and maintenance for these resources is obtaining the best/most up-to-date names, mailing addresses, phone numbers, email addresses, and birth and mortality information on the human subjects included in these research resources. Obtaining updated information ensures the success of research efforts that require contact with these individuals, such as newsletter mailings and recruitment activities. | |
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Advancing Artificial Intelligence Multiple Award Contract (AAMAC)
Dept. of Defense
| Updates to solicitation materials. | |
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Intelligence Support Services Joint III – Synopsis (H92402-24-R-0001)
Dept. of Defense
| Details of the posting location and anticipated timing of the solicitation provided. | |
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Master Announcement Instruction (MAI)
Dept. of Health and Human Services
| Solicitation closing date extended until 12/31/2024. | |
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Trust Accounting System Securities Pricing and Market Data Services
Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp.
| Amended Statement of Work published. | |
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Babel Street Software, Brand Name or Equal
Dept. of Defense
| Babel Street is an AI-enabled data analysis program that utilizes commercial and publicly available information. Babel Street provides an open source data collection and analysis capability that C4F does not currently possess. | |
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Notice of Intent to Sole Source - Economic Data Subscription
Dept. of Labor
| This particular package of U.S. Basic Economic Data, U.S. Specialized Economic Data, and U.S. Regional Data, software and support are offered exclusively through Haver Analytics, Inc. The individualized database subscriptions would be too costly to procure without a bundled service. | |
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Notice of Intent to Sole Source - Sofar Ocean
Dept. of the Interior
| The USGS St. Petersburg Coastal and Marine Science Center (SPCMSC) requires full access to the Spotter Platform, which includes the Spotter Dashboard and Application Programming Interface (API). The dashboard gives the user the ability to view real-time and historical data collected by Sofar Ocean’s network of Spotter buoys. The API gives the user the tools to build custom dashboards to visualize data and direct observations that pertains directly to their research. | |
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Notice of Intent to Sole Source to L3 Harris Technologies Inc.
Dept. of Defense
| We are procuring satellite and terrestrial Automated Information System (AIS) data from L3Harris. AIS is the primary data source for the SeaVision Common Operational Picture (COP) and is distributed to the U.S. Navy Maritime Operations Centers (MOCs), the Department of Transportation Maritime Safety and Security Information System (MSSIS), the United States Coast Guard, and over 100 Maritime Domain Awareness (MDA) partner countries that use SeaVision for maritime situational awareness. | |
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Bureau of Labor Statistics Virtual Data Enclave for Restricted Access Microdata Services
Dept. of Labor
| Award to National Opinion Research Center (NORC) for $9.6MM. | |
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Dataminr, Inc. First Alert V2 Software
Dept. of Defense
| This was non-competitive awarded to Datminr, Inc. and is the only product to meet the Government's unique capability requirement to tailor alerts. | |
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Support for the West Coast Ocean Data Portal
Dept. of the Interior
| Award to the Southern California Costal Water Research Project Authority for $250,000. | |
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User Centered Machine Learning
Dept. of Defense
| Defense Commercial Solutions Opening (CSO) Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) contract award for research and development for User Centered Machine Learning (UCML). | |
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Labeling Data Like Food: A Recipe for Reducing AI Bias | Data can’t be perfect, but it can be managed using a “food label” approach that reflects who and what the data was created for – all of which can increase the useful of data for artificial intelligence (AI) applications, a National Institutes of Health (NIH) official said. | |
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Dr. Radha Plumb, DOD Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Officer, Delivers Remarks at the Advana Industry Day | "Today we are here to talk about our second line of effort – focused on enabling enterprise-level data-driven digital solutions with tools ranging from advanced analytic applications that can yield greater insights in a fraction of the time to AI-enabled applications that can transform critical functions from the boardroom to the battlefield. And much of this builds off the work of Advana – our Advanced Enterprise Analytics at the Department of Defense – program." | |
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US Air Force secretly researching ML tool to teach their AI-drones how to adapt in battlefield in real-time | The US Air Force aims to modify and expand this platform, particularly by increasing its data capacity to handle the vast amounts of communication data generated during operations. This expansion is necessary to manage the complex permutations of radio frequency data involved in various environments. | |
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If Vice President Kamala Harris wins the election this November, her administration has the obligation and opportunity to break this cycle. Our roadmap focuses on three core priorities as a start: protecting against Big Brother surveillance; ending unwarranted and discriminatory domestic surveillance and investigation; and implementing strong safeguards for artificial intelligence and data privacy. | |
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Federal government outpacing state, local agencies on AI adoption, survey finds | State and local government agencies lag behind their federal counterparts in the use, training, policy and adoption of artificial intelligence tools, according to a report published Wednesday by the professional services firm Ernst & Young. | |
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I&B Ministry bets big on Artificial Intelligence & Machine Learning -powered dashboard to analyse news stories | Key features of the multilingual content-supported tool will include historical data analysis, language analysis, real-time awareness, customisable alerts, social media integration for observing discussions, engagement, trends, data visualisation, security measures for ensuring data integrity and confidentiality, report generation, contextual sentiment analysis, and AI-enabled decision support system providing options for implementing countermeasures or corrective actions based on media feedback. | |
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House Oversight Leaders Debut Bill to Sharpen FASC Supply Chain Protection | Specifically, the bill would create a standardized process for Congress to direct the exclusion or removal of sources of concern from the Federal procurement system by authorizing the FASC to issue binding orders. It would also expand the FASC’s focus to include acquisition security more broadly and require the FASC to proactively monitor and evaluate certain covered articles for ongoing risk. | |
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Flexible data platforms can supercharge government GenAI adoption | Governments face an uphill battle when adopting GenAI due to the complexity of existing data structures. In the public sector, there are vast amounts of data that are siloed and inaccessible, with varying confidentiality levels. Agencies need to find a way to use such data more efficiently to solve business needs. | |
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Thomson Reuters Special Services’ Thomas O’Neill Helps Agencies Better Understand, Minimize Risk | “It’s not just the data itself, but what we do with the data,” he said. “We pair smart people with compelling data and then build tools to better understand it, to curate it. The data itself can tell the first chapter of the story, but we are building capabilities that allow us to tell you the next five things you maybe didn’t even know existed in the story.” | |
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AI will make some people 'uninsurable', warns UK financial watchdog | Rathi highlighted the issue of “AI-enabled hyper-personalisation” in insurance, a technology that tailors insurance products and pricing to individual customers based on extensive data analysis. | |
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As Google’s antitrust trial intensifies, the ad industry speculates the consequences of a potential breakup | Let’s say Google spins off its demand-side platform (DSP) business. That could force it to open up YouTube’s ad inventory to other DSPs, creating a wave of competition. But would that even be possible, given that the DSP is also used to buy Google’s search ads? Those might be out of scope for the antitrust remedies, which focus on online display advertising. | |
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AI’s Dependency on High-Quality Data: A Double-Edged Sword for Organizations | Artificial intelligence (AI) holds the promise of transforming industries and driving innovation. However, its success is deeply dependent on the availability of high-quality data. While improved data quality can unlock significant benefits, achieving and maintaining such quality presents considerable challenges. This reliance on data is a double-edged sword, providing both substantial opportunities and potential risks for organizations. | |
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FTC Challenges H&R Block's Marketing and Data Practices | In this episode of his "Clearly Conspicuous" podcast series, "FTC Challenges H&R Block's Marketing and Data Practices," consumer protection attorney Anthony DiResta discusses the Federal Trade Commission's (FTC) actions against H&R Block for alleged deceptive practices, including deleting consumer data, making downgrades difficult and deceiving consumers about free tax preparation services. | |
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2024 INSCOM Advance Planning Brief to Industry | The virtual APBI session consists of presentations from the Small Business Administration, PEOEIS (CHESS contracts) and INSCOM requirement sponsors providing overviews or upcoming contract opportunities. | |
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The Federal Data Prospector is curated by Carpe Datum employees, and delivers fresh content about the intersection of the data and analytics industry and the Federal Government for businesses who want to start or grow their public sector practices.
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