"The Secretary of Defense should ensure that the Chief Digital and AI Officer, in conjunction with other DOD acquisition policy offices as appropriate, prioritize establishing department-wide AI acquisition guidance, including leveraging key private company factors, as appropriate," the report said.
The Defense Department is in the process of planning to develop such guidance, but it has not defined concrete plans and has no timeline to do so, the report said.
"Although numerous entities across DOD are acquiring, developing, or already using AI, DOD has not issued department-wide guidance for how its components should approach acquiring AI," the report added.
Without department-wide and tailored service-level guidance, the Defense Department is missing an opportunity to ensure that it is consistently acquiring AI capabilities in a manner that accounts for the unique challenges associated with AI, according to the report.