Lynne Parker, assistant director for artificial intelligence at the White House, said a number of agencies launched individual initiatives to educate and prepare employees for future integration of artificial intelligence into their operations, Federal Times reported Friday. 

“Agencies are stepping up on their own to create opportunities for people to maybe enroll in a short-term learning course where they can gain skills in IT areas or cybersecurity areas or AI areas,” Parker said at a recent National Academy of Public Administration event. “Because each agency knows the kinds of skills and the kinds of work that they do, they’re best suited to create these training programs.”

Despite the Trump administration promising AI will not entirely replace personnel in their jobs, Parker admitted the technology may take over some tasks in the future. 

“It’s quite likely that most of us will have some tasks or parts of our jobs that will be impacted by technology, AI, automation and so forth,” the White House official said. There are some areas “where AI is particularly well-suited that there may be some impact in the sense at the job goes away.” 

Parker cited studies suggesting that AI can only replace humans in a small percentage of jobs. However, Karen Shrum, principal for government and public sector at Ernst and Young, said the technology could replace people in millions of jobs. A 2018 future jobs report published by the World Economic Forum estimated that automated technologies could displace 75 million jobs worldwide by 2022. 

Vice Adm. Matthew Kohler, the top information warfare officer at the U.S. Navy, told C4ISRNET in an interview published Monday that the service considers information warfare as decisive both in daily operations and high-end kinetic fight. 

“In information warfare, while the rest of the warfare areas are involved in the high-end conflict [eventually], we consider the high-end conflict now. Constant contact with the enemy in terms of cybersecurity, being able to operate within the [electromagnetic spectrum], all of those. We consider ourselves in contact with the adversary now,” Kohler said. 

Kohler said the Naval Information Warfighting Development Center that was established about two years ago helped the service fill a spectrum of warfighting training and develop warfighting tactics instructors.

“A key part of NIWDC is really getting after advanced tactics, techniques and procedures. Those are capabilities that they have succeeded in the last two years of delivering. That allows you to take the capabilities you have now and use them better; putting them in the hands of soldiers and letting them innovate,” he noted. 

Kohler said the change in operational environment prompted the service to reconfirm its need for information-based skills such as navy cryptologic warfare, naval intelligence, meteorology, space and oceanography. He also cited the need for the service to quickly deliver new capabilities to sailors and other personnel.

The General Services Administration is establishing a community of practice to enable federal government officials to share ideas and explore opportunities to advance the implementation of robotic process automation. 

GSA said Friday that Ed Burrows of the agency’s office of the chief financial officer will chair the RPA CoP, which will outline the best practices and determine technical options to realize the benefits of RPA and transition the federal workforce to high-value work in support of a cross-agency priority goal in the President’s Management Agenda. GSA CFO Gerard Badorrek and Anil Cheriyan, director of the agency’s Technology Transformation Services, will serve as executive sponsors of the CoP.

“By creating a RPA CoP, the federal government can reduce duplication and streamline efforts to implement RPA across government to help advance agency missions today, and into the future. The GSA Office of the CFO will leverage the existing TTS CoP management capabilities and expertise to lead the RPA CoP,” according to GSA.

Southwest Regional Maintenance Center delivered 22 sets of 3D printed fuse box covers to guided missile cruiser USS Lake Erie. The deliveries, that include installation brackets and bolts, is the first shipment of parts made via SWRMC’s additive manufacturing process, the U.S. Navy said Friday.

The center’s 3D printing team manufactured the covers to protect fuses and respective holders from accidents. The team developed guidelines to help sailors install the covers without the center’s supervision. The creation of the cover stems from Petty Officer 2nd Class Joe Smith’s observation that fuses are vulnerable to accidental damage due to the fuse box’s location. 

“SWRMC’s ability to deliver orders of 3D printed parts to ships is a high value-added capability to the support we provide to ships in availabilities,” said Capt. David Hart, commanding officer at SWRMC.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology issued its updated guidance on mobile application vetting and security that allows organizations to explore new resources to secure apps. On Friday the revised 2015 Vetting the Security of Mobile Applications document was published, assisting organizations with assessment of mobile applications for cybersecurity vulnerabilities. 

Agencies can now use data from the National Information Assurance Partnership, the Open Web Application Security Project, the MITRE Corp and NIST to determine requirements for mobile app security.  The document also details how to identify vulnerabilities and how agencies can integrate the process into its general security posture.

The revision “goes into a greater—and updated—exploration of the current threat landscape facing mobile apps,” according to an NIST statement. “Furthermore, it includes and aligns itself with current guidelines and recommendations being made by both industry and other federal partners.”