[co-author: Christina Barone, Public Policy Specialist]

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is seeking public comment on their draft plan titled U.S. Leadership in AI: Plan for Federal Engagement in Developing Technical Standards and Related Tools. The draft document was released as a response to President Trump’s February 2019 Executive Order titled “Maintaining American Leadership in Artificial Intelligence (AI),” which directs NIST to issue a “plan for federal engagement in the development of technical standards and related tools in support of reliable, robust, and trustworthy systems that use AI technologies.” The NIST draft plan serves as a roadmap for strengthening engagement across federal agencies to develop AI technically sound and appropriate standards and priorities for research to promote United States leadership in AI.

In addition to the document’s guiding blueprint, the draft plan recommends four actions the federal government should commit to in order to speed up the development of trustworthy AI technologies:

• Bolster AI standards-related knowledge, leadership and federal agency coordination.
• Promote focused research to advance and accelerate the exploration of how trustworthiness can be incorporated within AI standards and tools.
• Expand and support public-private partnerships to develop and use AI standards and related tools to advance trustworthy AI.
• Engage internationally to advance AI standards for U.S. economic, national security interests and other development activities.

Comments can be submitted to ai_standards@nist.gov through July 19, 2019. As stipulated by the February 2019 Executive Order, a final plan is due to the White House on August 10, 2019.