The federal government discloses more than 1,700 AI use cases; CISA delivers new directive to agencies on securing cloud environments

A consolidated list of federal artificial intelligence use cases released by the White House on Wednesday shows agencies more than doubled the amount of uses reported last year. Per the 2024 consolidated inventory, which is available on the Office of Management and Budget’s GitHub, 37 federal agencies have reported 1,757 public AI uses. A consolidated list released by the White House last year documented 710 use cases. The top three categories of uses, per a Chief Information Officer Council post Wednesday, were “mission-enabling (internal agency support), health and medical, and government services (includes benefits and service delivery).” The consolidated inventory is the product of an annual AI inventory process that was initially established in December 2020 and has continued to evolve. It gives the latest snapshot of how the federal government is handling the rapidly growing technology and reflects the Biden administration’s safety-based approach to AI. Federal civilian agencies have a new list of cyber-related requirements to address after the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency on Tuesday issued guidance regarding the implementation of secure practices for cloud services. CISA’s Binding Operational Directive (BOD) 25-01 instructs agencies to identify all of its cloud instances and implement assessment tools, while also making sure that their cloud environments are aligned with the cyber agency’s Secure Cloud Business Applications (SCuBA) configuration baselines. CISA Director Jen Easterly said in a statement that the actions laid out in the directive are “an important step” toward reducing risk across the federal civilian enterprise, though threats loom in “every sector.” The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Monday-Friday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast  on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Spotify and YouTube.