The Government Accountability Office has called on the Federal Aviation Administration to implement a quantitative approach to assess skill gaps among FAA employees who perform mission-critical work to help them prepare for emerging aviation technology trends.

GAO said Thursday its recommendation to the FAA's human resource management office follows a review of workforce planning methods at the U.S. regulatory agency for civil aviation activities.

The audit agency found that FAA personnel response rates to the Department of Transportation's 2020 workforce assessment study ranged only from 12 percent to 25 percent, which may not offer a complete picture to determine what essential skills agency employees need to keep up with technological changes.

FAA launched its Strategic Workforce Planning Initiative in 2018 to analyze data analytics, project management and cybersecurity skills and the agency conducted qualitative interviews of managers and staff members in 2019 to gather insight on skill gaps, but GAO says the discussions lacked measurable data to identify what needs to be addressed.

The office noted that FAA should determine competencies that are necessary for agency personnel to adapt to innovations such as the potential integration of unmanned aircraft systems into the national airspace system.

The Defense Information Systems Agency has unveiled the Pentagon’s first zero trust reference architecture that seeks to protect critical assets from threat actors by embedding security throughout the network. 

DISA said Thursday it worked on the reference architecture in collaboration with the DOD chief information officer, National Security Agency and U.S. Cyber Command.

“The intent and focus of zero-trust frameworks is to design architectures and systems to assume breach, thus limiting the blast radius and exposure of malicious activity,” said Brandon Iske, security enablers portfolio chief engineer at DISA.

Joe Brinker, Security Enablers Portfolio manager at DISA, said Joint Interoperability Test Command and DISA’s Architecture and Standards Engineering Office also helped develop the reference architecture.

“Moving forward, DISA will continue to partner with DoD components in planning the implementation of ZT across the department and the development of ZT-aligned enterprise capabilities,” Brinker added.

To register for this virtual forum, visit the Potomac Officers Club Events page.

A U.S. Navy team won an inter-service racing competition hosted by Amazon Web Services and aimed to teach participants the basics of machine learning.

Naval Information Warfare Center Atlantic-led Team DeepBlueSea received the DeepRacer golden trophy after its victory against six finalists from the Navy and seven others from the Army in building the fastest ML-based autonomous race car, Dave Bader, lead business development manager at AWS, wrote in a post Tuesday.

Race participants used the Amazon SageMaker service to develop reinforcement learning models that were later applied to drive 1/18th scale vehicles during multiple timed races on a physical track.

The RL technique worked to assimilate each car with the racing environment through a reward system in which desired actions such as staying in a vehicle lane earn an incentive.

“This event was a great learning experience and one of many ways we will ensure the Navy leverages data and AI to achieve decision superiority in warfighting and business,” said Rob Keiser, a NIWC Atlantic senior scientific technical manager and DeepBlueSea leader.

Sai Liu, a software development lead at Army Communications-Electronics Command, noted that the competition offered basic information on ML that would come in handy should the service pursue the technology in the future.

DeepRacer is powered by the AWS RoboMaker cloud robotics service and designed to provide users hands-on ML learning experience that involves 3D racing simulation technology.

Veritone announced on Friday its launch of Veritone MARVEL.ai, an end-to-end Voice-as-a-Service  (VAAS) solution that enables media companies, brands, marketers, celebrities and influencers, many of whom are current Veritone customers and partners, to create, manage, license and monetize hyper-realistic synthetic voices.

“Veritone MARVEL.ai is a natural extension of our expertise in artificial intelligence, digital content licensing and audio advertising. By offering the most advanced synthetic voice models and supporting both text-to-speech and speech-to-speech processes, Veritone MARVEL.ai is setting the standard for the synthetic content ecosystem,” commented Ryan Steelberg, Veritone’s president.

“Whether you’re a media company, brand, or an influencer, celebrity or athlete, the ability to easily create custom, authentic voices means that Veritone MARVEL.ai is a true game-changer for the media and entertainment industries,” Steelberg added.  

Veritone’s MARVEL.ai is a significant technology because it can support both text-to-speech and speech-to-speech processes and offers the first complete, end-to-end suite of voice capabilities. These capabilities include creation and usage, management, production workflows, licensing, compliance and clearance and monetization. 

MARVEL.ai is powered by aiWARE, Veritone’s operating system for artificial intelligence. MARVEL.ai also enables users to leverage multiple best-in-class voice engines, providing them with the best solution possible for their specific needs. 

MARVEL.ai’s incorporation of aiWARE enables users to combine top voice engines with other cognitive capabilities. For example, translation, sentiment analysis and content classification create the highest quality content at scale.

Brent Weinstein, chief information officer of Veritone’s customer United Talent Agency, remarked, “As advances in audio AI create new opportunities for talent, there is a need for reliable technology to manage and protect these rights. Veritone’s solution, coupled with their premium audio expertise, creates a new opportunity for our clients to unlock new revenue streams in a safe and secure manner.”

About Veritone

Veritone is a leading provider of artificial intelligence (AI) technology and solutions. The company’s proprietary operating system, aiWARE™, powers a diverse set of AI applications and intelligent process automation solutions that transform commercial and government organizations. aiWARE orchestrates an expanding ecosystem of machine learning models to transform audio, video, and other data sources into actionable intelligence. The company’s AI developer tools enable its customers and partners to easily develop and deploy custom applications that leverage the power of AI to improve operational efficiency and unlock untapped opportunities dramatically. 

QTS Realty Trust (NYSE: QTS), a leading provider of software-defined and mega scale data center solutions, today announced that Telia Carrier, owner and operator of the world's #1 ranked global Internet backbone, has deployed its full suite of connectivity services in QTS' Piscataway, NJ and Irving, TX mega data centers.

Telia Carrier has deployed terabit scale transmission gear and core routers to offer its full suite of services and enhance the diverse connectivity ecosystem at both mega scale QTS campuses.

Telia Carrier is the top ranked global IP backbone, with customers in more than 125 countries, operations in 35 of these and network presence in 120 cities worldwide. Telia Carrier offers a broad portfolio of connectivity services, including DWDM, DDoS, IP Transit, Cloud Connect and Ethernet services.

QTS' New Jersey Network Access Point (NJ NAP), located within QTS' mega data center in Piscataway, NJ, is a highly connected regional hub serving network carriers and enterprises, including those serving the financial services market. Telia Carrier's full network suite deployment will add to the NJ NAP's expanding ecosystem of fiber networks, transport networks, cloud access networks, internet exchanges, and direct access to 10 transatlantic subsea cables including the new AEC-2.  

QTS' mega data center in Irving, TX, provides a strategic central location enabling optimal, fiber-rich connectivity coast-to-coast. The addition of Telia Carrier supports increasing demand from QTS and Telia Carrier customers seeking diverse long-haul routes across the Southwest and into Mexico as well as IP, Cloud, Ethernet, DWDM and DDoS services. 

The Missile Defense Agency (MDA) has announced it will deorbit two Space Tracking and Surveillance System (STSS) experimental missile warning satellites in the coming years and will focus on the development of next-generation Hypersonic and Ballistic Tracking Space Sensor (HBTSS) satellites to counter hypersonic missile threats, C4ISRNET reportedThursday.

“The combination of high speed, maneuverability and relatively low altitude of some of the emerging advanced missile threats makes them challenging targets for our current missile defense systems,” MDA stated in a January statement.

“HBTSS is needed, since we cannot populate the Earth and the oceans with terrestrial radars to meet this need. The ‘birth-to-death’ tracking that HBTSS can provide when integrated with terrestrial sensors will make it possible to maintain custody of missile threats from launch through intercept regardless of location.”

The experimental STSS has advanced the concept of space-based missile warning by demonstrating the ability to intercept a ballistic missile using orbital sensor data. However, depleted fuel reserves, outdated control systems and the launch of a new, ambitious missile warning satellite constellation on the horizon convinced the agency to end the STSS program.

The MDA has already awarded two contracts for the HBTSS prototypes, with L3Harris receiving $133 million and Northrop Grumman securing $155 million in support of the initiative. The new systems will work in conjunction with SDA’s tracking layer, a proliferated constellation of infrared sensors in low Earth orbit that can track hypersonic and ballistic threats.

The tracking layer will pass custody of missiles from satellite to satellite via a planned on-orbit mesh network as the missile fly. Custody will eventually be given to the HBTSS satellites, which have more advanced sensors that can provide targeting data to interceptors. HBTSS prototypes are expected to launch in 2023.

Sens. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, and Martin Heinrich, D-N.M., have introduced two bills that call for the implementation of the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence’s (NSCAI) recommendations to bolster AI-related research and development, talent recruitment and transparency efforts in the government.

The Senate Artificial Intelligence Caucus co-founders said Wednesday the first bill, Artificial Intelligence Capabilities and Transparency Act, would create a chief digital recruiting officer position at the departments of the Defense, Energy and within the intelligence community.

The AICT Act would also establish a $50 million DOD fund for pilot initiatives meant to leverage the technology in military operations and direct the National Institute of Standards and Technology to develop an accreditation program for system assessors.

The second bill, Artificial Intelligence for the Military Act, seeks to take heed of the NSCAI recommendations related to the military workforce, specifically on expanding AI training of junior officers and DOD leaders.

Congress established NSCAI as part of the Fiscal Year 2019 National Defense Authorization Act to recommend strategies to drive government adoption of the technology.

If you’re interested in emerging technology, then check out GovCon Wire’s AI: Innovation in National Security Forum coming up on June 3rd. Click here to learn more.

The Defense Industrial Base Cybersecurity Assessment Center (DIBCAC) has allowed an anonymous company to move forward in the Department of Defense's contractor cybersecurity standards certification process, FedScoop reported.

The first company to gain the approval of DIBCAC will now await the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC) Accreditation Body's (CMMC-AB) decision on whether it will be granted the Certified Third Party Assessment Organization (C3PAO) status that will allow the company to conduct official audits to determine how mature a defense contractor's cybersecurity.

If approved as C3PAO, the company will be able to assess its customer's cybersecurity maturity compliance with the CMMC requirements.

"The certification process is multi-tiered and [Defense Contract Management Agency’s] role is to verify and validate the ability of a C3PAO to protect the data that will be entrusted to them,” said Matthew Montgomery, spokesperson for the DCMA, where DIBCAC falls under.

The center has yet to approve its initial assessments of other organizations looking to achieve C3PAO under CMMC.

If you're interested in the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification then check out the Potomac Officers Club's 2021 CMMC Forum coming up on June 16. Click here to learn more.