AI, Commercial Firms Key to Future of GEOINT.

• Author: Lapinski, Nicholas
• Position: NDIA Policy Points

The United States relies on its constellations of spy satellites to provide decisionmakers with critical information and data. But why should taxpayers fund advances in collection capabilities if the United States cannot process, exploit and disseminate all of the raw data it already has?

Most of the raw data collected by the intelligence community is not processed, which arguably defeats the entire purpose of having extensive technical collection systems. Geospatial intelligence processing involves the conversion of "data into a useable form or formats suitable for analysis, production and application by end users," according to the Joint Chiefs of Staff's Joint Publication 2-03, "Geospatial Intelligence in Joint Operations."

The value of time sensitive data collection is limited if the material is not processed quickly. However, providing more efficient GEOINT processing can be achieved through commercial partnerships and the use of artificial intelligence.

In an interview, Mark Lowenthal, former assistant director of central intelligence for analysis and production from 2002 to 2005 and author of Intelligence: From Secrets to Policy, noted that the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency has been using a variety of techniques to help process increasing amounts of imagery.

Bolstering GEOINT commercial partnerships can help to process most--or perhaps all--of the raw geospatial data collected by the intelligence community. NGA and the National Reconnaissance Office have already partnered with some commercial organizations, and these efforts are likely to expand in the future. While there are no plans by the NGA or NRO to list all their potential partners, larger contracts are anticipated to be negotiated within the next few years.

The NRO is sponsoring studies to determine the extent of companies' respective capabilities and determine which firms can provide reliable support to the agency's mission. The next step will be establishing procurement contracts that provide a clearer picture of the future partners for the spy organization.

Lowenthal noted that the NGA created a project called GEOINT Pathfinder, which sought to answer key intelligence questions from unclassified sources only. One result has been NGA Tearline, which involves NGA partnering "with expert private groups to create public-facing and authoritative open-source intelligence on various strategic, economic and humanitarian intelligence topics that tend to be underreported...