DHS Begins 90-Day Assessment of China Threats, Launches AI Task Force
DHS is beginning a 90-day assessment of the “current threats and challenges” posed by China, including how China’s “malign economic influence” is exploiting U.S. supply chains. The agency also announced a new artificial intelligence task force to examine how DHS can use AI to better screen cargo and identify imports produced with forced labor.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
If your job depends on informed compliance, you need International Trade Today. Delivered every business day and available any time online, only International Trade Today helps you stay current on the increasingly complex international trade regulatory environment.
In an April 20 memo sent to DHS Undersecretary for Strategy, Policy and Plans Robert Silvers, Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said the 90-day assessment, which he called a China “Threats Sprint,” should partially focus on how DHS provides best practices on reducing “risks within the supply chain, resolving acute supply chain disruptions” and “ensuring that supply chains are free from forced labor.”
The memo also mentions five other focus areas, including disrupting imports of fentanyl and precursor chemicals, and DHS efforts to share Chinese counterintelligence information across the government. Mayorkas said DHS office leaders should use the “sprint” to “assess the current threats and challenges the [People's Republic of China] poses to their missions and look ahead to how those threats may evolve.”
In a separate announcement, the agency said its new AI Task Force will report "regularly" to Mayorkas "on its work and AI efforts across the Department." That work will include examining how DHS can "integrate AI into our efforts to enhance the integrity of our supply chains." The agency "will seek to deploy AI to more ably screen cargo, identify the importation of goods produced with forced labor, and manage risk."
The task force also will review how DHS can leverage AI to counter imports of fentanyl. "We will explore using this technology to better detect fentanyl shipments, identify and interdict the flow of precursor chemicals around the world, and target for disruption key nodes in the criminal networks," the agency said.
The AI Task Force must submit its first report to Mayorkas within 60 days, and Silvers will submit a report to Mayorkas within 45 days to summarize the agency's findings from the “sprint." This report should identify “enduring enhancements” to DHS’ “posture to counter" China threats, including “further opportunities for public-private partnership, best practices that can be applied Department-wide, and opportunities for further enhancements to ensure DHS has the tools and capabilities to counter PRC threats not only today, but well into the future.”