Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard said on Tuesday that her office used artificial intelligence to help decide which files should be declassified in the government’s investigation into the assassination of John F. Kennedy.
Gabbard attested to the use of AI and machine learning in her office while speaking at an Amazon Web Services conference, saying it’s helped specifically with declassification.
“We have released thousands, tens of thousands of documents related to the assassinations of JFK and Senator Robert F. Kennedy. And we have been able to do that through the use of AI tools far more quickly than what was done previously, which is to have humans go through and look at every single one of these pages,” Gabbard said.
Gabbard said the AI tool can look for information such as anything that may be “sensitive for living family members,” which speeds up an otherwise lengthy process.
As part of President Donald Trump’s promise to release previously classified documents in cases of public interest, in March, the administration released more than 1,100 files part of the government’s investigation into the 1963 assassination of JFK.
However, some of those files were released without necessary redactions to shield private information, such as Social Security numbers, birth dates, and birthplaces, belonging to former congressional staffers and others who are still living.
Shortly after the Washington Post reported the revelation, the White House quickly implemented a plan to assist those whose personal information was disclosed, including issuing them new Social Security numbers and free credit monitoring.
But Gabbard’s admission that her Director’s Initiatives Group, a task force she created to “restore transparency and accountability” in the intelligence community, used AI for the declassification process raises some questions about it’s effectiveness in detecting “sensitive” information.
It’s unclear how much of a role the AI may have had in the recent JFK assassination declassification.
The Independent has asked the Director of National Intelligence’s office for comment.
AI tools are becoming increasingly more common in workplaces, including the federal government, to streamline processes and improve efficiency.
The Securities and Exchange Commission and Federal Trade Commission use AI to detect fraud or other financial misconduct by analyzing large datasets, the National Conference of State Legislatures said.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement also uses AI to verify, validate, correct, and normalize addresses, phone numbers, names, and ID numbers across datasets, the Department of Homeland Security said last year.
“10,000 hours of media content, for example, that normally would take eight people, 48 hours to comb through, now takes one person one hour through the use of some of the AI tools that we have here,” Gabbard said.
