Mark Brady, chief data officer of the U.S. Air Force Space Command, has said that the organization established a strategy for leveraging data to address everyday challenges, Federal News Network reported Tuesday.

Brady told the publication that the command intends to collate large amounts of information to drive artificial intelligence and machine learning efforts while also supporting interoperability between systems. In addition, AFSPC plans to establish a “super system” that consolidates all of the command’s systems and deploy a “data catalog” approach to inform the development of next-generation technologies.

“You need a place where people can access data in some uniform, well-defined fashion rather than doing it ad hoc,” Brady said. “Then you need to produce policies for new and existing data systems to produce data that is more efficient.”

Ellen Lord, defense undersecretary for acquisition and sustainment and three-time Wash100 Award recipient, said the Department of Defense intends to simplify procurement of subsystems through rapid prototyping and fielding, USNI News reported Tuesday.

Lord told the publication that the goal is to accelerate major defense acquisition programs by streamlining mid-tier acquisition for certain components. The department’s mid-tier acquisition programs have expanded to more than 50 since November 2018, she added.

“We’re scheduled to publish formal policy in December, and I’m happy that we’re seeing positive results for our warfighters, taking an average of over two years out of each of the programs,” said Lord.

Her comments came two months after the Pentagon announced its intent to develop the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification standards for businesses seeking opportunities with the government. Lord said she expects the CMMC framework to be available in January 2020 ahead of full inclusion in requests for proposals by fall.

Bill Marion, deputy chief information officer of the U.S. Air Force, said service branches are aligned in their information technology delivery, FedScoop reported Tuesday.

“Services, cloud, the network, all of those elements – we have a consistent path we’re all going down together,” Marion said Tuesday at the Air Force Information Technology and Cyberpower event in Montgomery, Ala. “It truly is aligned.”

He said the U.S. Army agreed to “leverage” the Air Force’s Common Cloud Environment to accelerate its network modernization effort as well as the latter’s work around enterprise IT-as-a-service and network-as-a-service programs. Marion said the Air Force also plans to field its Cloud Hosted Enterprise Services program into the Pentagon’s $8B Defense Enterprise Office Solution contract for cloud-based collaboration tools.

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office is asking the public to submit input regarding the patenting of artificial intelligence intellectual property. USPTO hopes to determine whether it requires more examination guidance to increase the reliability of AI invention patenting, the office said Tuesday in a Federal Register notice.

The request for comments features 12 questions on concerns such as the elements of an AI invention, factors that constitute an AI inventor and patent owner, existing laws and patent eligibility. Other queries include AI-unique art considerations and the need for new intellectual property protections.

Interested parties may submit responses through Oct. 11.

The Transportation Security Administration will test a new identity verification process based on automated biometrics technology at the McCarran International Airport in Las Vegas. According to a Department of Homeland Security publication released Friday, TSA will conduct a short-term proof of concept to evaluate the use of Credential Authentication Technology with Camera to verify passengers going through the Travel Document Checker process.

CAT-C will process a passenger’s identity documents, capture real-time facial imagery and use facial matching algorithm to verify information. Passengers who will volunteer for the Privacy Impact Assessment still have to go through standard TDC verification procedures, according to TSA. The PIA follows TSA’s initial proof of concept at the Los Angeles International Airport which involved the use of automated electronic security gates fitted with cameras and facial recognition technology.

The assessment comes as part of TSA’s efforts to potentially deploy CAT-C as the primary identity verification platform for aviation security and enable personnel to “focus on other critical tasks and expediting security processes.” The agency also expects to extend the verification technology for individuals seeking access to airport sterile areas.

A spokesperson for the General Services Administration said GSA is on track to issue a solicitation for the consolidated schedule on the first day of fiscal year 2020, FCW reported Tuesday. GSA announced its plans to merge 24 contract schedules into a single government-wide vehicle to simplify the procurement process for agencies in November 2018.

The agency has received feedback from approximately 600 contractors on the plan and found that 94 percent of respondents agree on the clarity of the new schedule’s format.

According to a fact sheet for the Multiple Award Schedules consolidation, GSA will conduct a “mass modification” process or modify existing schedule contracts to move to the single schedule in the first half of FY 2020 under the second phase. The third phase will combine multiple contracts into a single vehicle by the second half of FY 2020.