The Federal Communications Commission intends to propose an initiative that will work to provide telehealth services to U.S. military veterans and low-income communities.

The Connected Care pilot program will help the agency gather data on connected care services and validate low-cost patient internet broadband services’ effects on healthcare delivery, the Office of the Federal Register said Tuesday.

The agency envisions to help healthcare providers engage with low-income communities through telemedicine technologies and assist medical responders in handling various health concerns from heart diseases to cancer.

FCC intends to run the program within the U.S. Air Force for three years under an estimated budget of $100M to support eligible healthcare providers. In addition, the agency looks to fund 20 projects with $5M each as part of the effort.

The U.S. Army looks to utilize cloud computing methods to help warfighters transmit and access data and software applications during missions, C4ISRNET reported Monday.

The military service plans to equip wearable sensors, drone systems and vehicle-mounted intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance platforms with cloud computing functions to augment communication capacities and drive the adoption of artificial intelligence technology.

Maj. Gen. Peter Gallagher, director of networks, services and strategy at the Army’s Office of the Army Chief Information Officer, said AI technology will help the service branch optimize mission planning function and simplify maintenance processes. He added that commanders can use AI to study various courses of action for future missions.

According to a report from research firm Frost & Sullivan, cloud computing will help warfighters manage large volumes of data to allow smooth tracking and vital sign monitoring functions.

The Government Accountability Office has assessed federal agencies’ efforts to manage identities of those who comment on public policy.

GAO discovered that seven of 10 sample agencies observe internal policy in handling the identities of these commenters in different ways, the accountability agency said in a report publicly released Friday. The study aims to address the lack of standards affecting how commenters are displayed.

Findings indicate there is a lack of uniformity in how agencies handle this matter. Agencies either only display input within a comment system or also maintain comments from external sources such as email archives, the report noted. Some agency practices also exhibit duplication of comments.

The Administrative Procedure Act provides directions on how agencies should process comments, but lacks rules on the disclosure and verification of commenter identities.

GAO recommends different agencies to implement policy that lays out requirements for posting comments and handling associated identity information. Affected agencies include the Environmental Protection Agency, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the Bureau of Land Management and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

Tim Chung, program manager for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s Subterrenean Challenge, said that the program is focused on the need to mitigate human involvement in hazardous underground operations, National Defense magazine reported Monday.

Chung noted in an interview with the publication at the agency’s Arlington, Va. headquarters that the agency developed the challenge to identify how new tools can be leveraged in evironments that lack lighting and navigation technologies such as GPS.

He added that the challenge will focus on autonomy, mobility, perception and networking capabilities which participants must combine for the program’s tunnel, urban and underground circuits.

DARPA selected 11 teams for the challenge’s first circuit in May and is continuing to accept applications for the urban and cave circuits in 2020 ahead of the final event in August 2021.