Open-Source Intelligence for Investigations

Overview

Development stage

DeployedSource: c) Deployed – The use case is being actively authorized or utilized to support the functions or mission of an agency.

High-impact designation

Not high-impactSource: c) Not high-impact

Impact justification

Not reported

Start date

2023-09-01 (day precision)Source: 2023-09-01T00:00:00

Withheld from public reporting

Not reported

Mission

Topic area

Law Enforcement

Operational functions

Biometrics and identity Derived by keyword rules; see methodology

Problem the AI is intended to solve

The AI is intended to solve the problem of analysts having to manually search and make sense of vast amounts of multilingual, multimodal publicly available online data, which makes it difficult to efficiently identify relevant identifiers, high‑risk content, and patterns needed to support Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) investigations.

Expected benefits

These AI tools significantly reduce the time and effort required to sift through large datasets, improve the ability to uncover relevant information, and enhance the overall efficiency and effectiveness of HSI’s investigative operations.

System outputs

The outputs of these platforms include flagged risk alerts, extracted identifiers, image and sentiment classification, and suggested investigative leads. These platforms do not perform biometric identification, facial recognition for identity verification, autonomous targeting, or automated enforcement actions. All AI-enabled outputs are subject to mandatory human-in-the-loop review prior to any investigative, operational, or enforcement action.

Technology

AI classification

Generative AISource: Generative AI: AI that generates new or synthetic content (e.g., images, videos, audio, text, code).

System name(s)

Not reported

Custom-developed code

No

Public source code

Not reported

Sourcing

How it was built

Purchased from vendorSource: a) Purchased from a vendor

Vendor (as reported)

Penlink, Fivecast

Vendors (standardized)

None on the standard list

A vendor is the supplier named by the agency. It does not identify the underlying model or AI technology.

Data and privacy

Involves PII

Yes

Privacy Impact Assessment

www.dhs.gov ↗

Authorization to Operate

No

Demographic features

a) Race/Ethnicity; b) Sex; c) Age

Training and evaluation data

The AI platforms used for open-source intelligence investigations rely on pre-trained large language models, natural language processing models, and other third-party AI services. These models are trained on publicly available and commercially licensed data. No DHS or agency data is used to train, fine-tune, or develop the AI models.

Federal Data Catalog

Not reported

Governance

0 of 8 minimum-practice questions answered. A blank answer means the agency reported nothing; it does not mean the practice is absent.

Potential impacts and how they were identified

Not reported