A10 SSN_AI OSINT Software Support Services.pdf

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE

WASHINGTON HEADQUARTERS SERVICES

ACQUISITION DIRECTORATE

SOURCES SOUGHT NOTICE

AI OSINT Software Support Services

1.0 General Information

Document Type: Sources Sought Notice #HQ0034SEC08022024 Title: AI OSINT Software Support Services Sources Sought Post Date: August 2, 2024 Response Date: August 9, 2024 at 2:00 p.m. Eastern time NAICS Code: 541511, Custom Computer Programming Services Product Service Code: R423 Support-Professional: Intelligence Contracting Office Address: Washington Headquarters Services, Acquisition Directorate, 4800 Mark Center Drive, Suite 09F09, Alexandria, VA 22350-3400

2.0 Sources Sought

To facilitate market research, the Government is looking to identify qualified sources under the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) 541511, Custom Computer Programming Services, for a new requirement for Artificial Intelligence (AI) Open-Source Intelligence (OSINT) Software Support Services. If you have any comments or find any ambiguities, please provide your information and comment in your response to this notice.

This Sources Sought Notice is for information and planning purposes only, and shall NOT be construed as a solicitation or as an obligation on the part of the Government. This notice does not obligate the Government to award a contract or otherwise pay for the information provided in the response. The Government reserves the right to use information provided by respondents for any purpose deemed necessary and legally appropriate. Any concern responding to this notice should ensure that its response is complete and sufficiently detailed to allow the Government to determine the concern’s qualifications to perform the work.

Respondents are advised that the Government is under no obligation to acknowledge receipt of the information received, or provide feedback to respondents with respect to any information submitted.

After a review of the responses received, a pre-solicitation synopsis and solicitation MAY be published at the System for Award Management (SAM) Contract Opportunities at https://sam.gov/.

Responses to this notice will not be considered adequate responses to a solicitation.

3.0 Background

The Pentagon Force Protection Agency (PFPA) is a defense agency that falls under the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD). PFPA’s mission is to provide force protection, security, and law enforcement as required for the people, facilities, infrastructure, and other resources on the Pentagon Reservation and for Department of Defense (DoD) activities and DoD occupied facilities not under the jurisdiction of a Military Department within the National Capital Region (NCR). This responsibility includes physical security, antiterrorism and force protection, chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and explosive (CBRNE) protection and other key functions. In order to fully respond to the responsibilities of the mission, PFPA requires a wide range of non-personal services in support of the current and evolving PFPA Divisions. The Requiring Activity is the PFPA Investigations and Intelligence Division (IID) Open Source Team (OST).

The contractor shall provide AI Open-Source Intelligence Image and Video Recognition and Alerting Software Services in order to devise, configure, operate, and maintain advanced artificial intelligence (AI) software systems for PFPA/IID, which includes processing software improvement requests, support, futures analytical reporting, program analysis, developing contractors’ Detection as a Service (DaaS) program Standard Operating Procedures, developing process maps, and following agency-specific regulations. Contractor shall provide open-source analysis to provide early detection from open source information utilizing AI, awareness of threatening communications to High Risk Personnel (DoDI O-2000.22), the Pentagon Reservation, leased facilities.

The Washington Headquarters Services (WHS) Acquisition Directorate (AD) Enterprise Security and Services Division (ESSD) Security Branch (SEC), the Contracting Activity, is issuing this notice to survey industry to see if qualified sources are available to provide these services. The following Section 4.0 provides service requirement critical task areas pulled from the draft Performance Work Statement (PWS). The PWS is more extensive than this, but the following portions of the PWS describe the broad range of functions and tasks in support of this effort, and provide a valuable insight into the scope and complexity of the requirement.

4.0 Service Requirement

A. Facility and Security Clearances: The contractor must possess an active Top Secret Facility Clearance, and contractor employee(s) must have active Top Secret Security Clearances.

B. Non-Key Personnel: System Architect Level 3 (1 FTE). Given the level of complexity of this effort, the System Architect Level 3 shall have at least 5 years of experience inclusive to Headquarter (HQ) level operations with field level, as well as the ability to provide on-site contractor Lead System Architecture and intelligence analysis (with a broad base in intelligence analysis, open-source intelligence, and law enforcement support) support to assist the PFPA Open Source Team Chief in managing the development, compilation, reconciliation, and review of the reports, tasks, and deliverables to provide onsite software help desk support, create, and de-conflict new PFPA unique contractor software Project Names, Project Numbers, and Project Descriptions. Top Secret Security Clearance with SCI.

3 to 5 years of computer science experience and/or Artificial Intelligence (AI) / Machine Learning (ML). 5 to 7 years of intelligence analyst experience. Minimum of 2 years utilizing and understanding of managed attribution. Minimum 2 years of experience working with DOD agencies, highly preferred. In lieu of years of experience previously noted, the Government will accept a minimum of a bachelor’s degree in related field of computer science and 2 years of System Architect experience.

C. Artificial Intelligence OSINT Image and Video Recognition Software: Contractor shall provide software that collects, enriches, analyzes, and disseminates interpreted data using artificial intelligence of at least 50 million datapoints from publicly available information in near real time. This will include real-time narrative/text-based, video, and image alerts of threat identification.

a. Software Requirements and Capability:

1. Software will include facial validation/recognition, optical character recognition (OCR) to detect relevant textual information in images, and specialized object detection algorithms to identify context-specific items or symbols. Also includes character optical recognition (OCR) to detect relevant textual information in images, and specialized object detection algorithms to identify context-specific items or symbols.

2. Facial Validation with an accuracy of 98 percent for up to 15 High Risk Protectee’s (HRP) that are of PFPA’s mission asset as per DoDI 2000.22.

3. Software must have the ability to maintain access to social media platforms and be flexible with continuous change to social media platforms.

4. 24-hour Monitoring for all images, videos and text related to use cases.

5. Must have information streams regionally divided into accessible visual user dashboards profiles.

a. Monitoring one Base Region (North America) with three use cases:

i. Physical Location Threat Detection

ii. Locations to include facilities provided document by PFPA.

iii. Location overwatch for 5 locations within the designated region

b. Local Event and Situational Awareness

i. Monitor local event and situational awareness on online PAI data sources.

6. Contractor will Provide one rotating OCONUS Region Feed based on HRP Travel

i. Regional feed will cover HRP travel in designated OCONUS which will be divided by Department of Defense Combatant Commands, to include

EUCOM, INDOPACOM, CENTCOM/LEVANT.

ii. Contractor will be given a minimum 2-week notice prior to OCONUS travel to prepare feed for HRP.

iii. Once OCONUS travel is complete, regional DaaS feed is turned off.

iv. Contractor will provide 5 licenses provided for Dark web access and misattribution access.

b. Software Integration Requirements:

1. Contractor shall provide at least five licenses of the following:

a. Provide licenses for their enterprise cloud-based system during the period of performance;

i. ML enriched outputs and ensembled alerting from unfettered firehose Social

Networking Site (SNS) data feeds.

ii. Update/modify its existing AI/ML capabilities to perform PAI enhancement in its approved unclassified commercial environments as directed by contractor in consultation with the Customer.

iii. Persistently optimize the accuracy of its PAI detection and alerting models within cloud environments throughout the remaining duration of this effort.

iv. Contractor shall generate alerts with confidence values and will provide explainable and transparent scoring that is available to end users. In general, highest confidence alerts consist of multiple aggregated posts (contractor shall determine the minimum threshold) containing device location (geolocation) coordinates, or as otherwise defined by contractor in consultation with the Customer.

b. Computer Vision (CV)-Enrichment

i. Software will enrich all images derived from the SNS feed with mission relevant object detections and CV classification within a customer defined ontology as directed and re-prioritized by contractor in consultation with the Customer.

ii. OCR Detection & Extraction: software will extract alphanumeric identifiers and markings of interest from detected CV objects from images and videos to facilitate alerts and end user filters/workflows.

iii. Ontology: software will align its CV object labeling hierarchy and image categorization taxonomy to align with Customer labeling ontology requirements to enable UI/UX filtering and data fusion with other sources. OCR optimization shall also incorporate end user feedback and enable Geo-based Alerting.

iv. CV-filtering: software will implement and optimize CV models to include and/or exclude images from the SNS feed, especially false positives, as directed by contractor in consultation with the Customer

v. Contractor shall give the ability to government to determine the use of Not Safe For Work-Filtering.

b. Natural Language Processing (NLP)/ Natural Language generation (NLG) -Enrichment:

c. NLP/NLG enrichment ensembled to detect and or corroborate events delivered in near real time detection payloads with associated locations, underlying data and its provenance.

i. NLP-filtering: Contractor will leverage NLP to curate the firehose SNS feed, i.e., the inclusion and/or exclusion of keywords and SNS user accounts of interest, as directed by contractor in consultation with the Customer.

ii. NLG-Events: Employ AI/ML to combine CV, geo-registration, and key metrics defining alert generation criteria to deliver frequent and recurring alerts containing actionable information and/or subject matter expert (SME) level insights.

c. Communication and Alerting Services

a. Software shall integrate an end-to-end messing and alerting platform through

Android Team Awareness Kit (ATAK).

b. Alerting services shall utilize proximity alerting to inform Government personnel of critical information and collaboration for HRP support.

c. Alerting shall derive from texted based discovery, imagery-based discovery. Alerting can change based on program development.

d. Software shall provide mature and proprietary AI/ML models which enable detection of relevant PAI in 100+ languages across 50M+ sources.

e. Software shall ensure that all communications are secured and protected with 256-bit end-to-end encryption.

5.0 Submission

Interested firms should submit their Capability Statement via email to whs.mc-alex.ad.mbx.essd-security-solicitation@mail.mil, and include information regarding their experience and technical capabilities.

6.0 Response Format

To facilitate a timely and comprehensive review of all submitted responses, firms should respond using the format requested in this Notice. Any deviation from this format may lead to the Contracting Officer to determine that there is insufficient information to determine capabilities of the firm.

All interested firms having the experience, skills and capabilities necessary to perform the stated requirements are requested to provide a Capability Statement no more than 10 pages maximum.

All responses should be single spaced using 12 point Times New Roman font within an 8.5 by 11 inches’ page size. Capability response must include the following information:

Company name, address, point of contact name, telephone, and email address.

CAGE Code and their Unique Entity ID per the SAM.gov registration.

Indicate whether your company has an active registration in the System for Award

Management (SAM) (Yes/No) Size business pursuant to North American Industry Classification System (NAICS)

541611 Administrative Management and General Management Consulting Services.

Based on this NAICS Code o State whether your company is: Small Business (Yes/No); Woman Owned Small Business (Yes/No); Small Disadvantaged Business (Yes/No); 8(a) Certified (Yes/No)(include entry and exit dates from 8(a) Program); HUBZone Certified (Yes/No);

Service Disabled Veteran Owned Small Business (Yes/No); Service Disabled Veteran Small Business (Yes/No) as described in FAR Part 19.

A statement as to whether your company is domestically or foreign owned (if foreign, please indicate the country ownership).

Identify contracts your company has been awarded under NAICS541511, Custom Computer Programming Services . Additional information on NAICS codes may be found at www.sba.gov.

Recommended/suggested NAICS codes and PSC codes for this effort, and the rationale for using it.

Recommended/suggested contract type. The Government envisions a firm-fixed price (FFP), commercial contract.

Indicate if you firm has any contracts currently held with the Government to include any Federal Supply Schedules listed under GSA Advantage or a Governmentwide Acquisition Contract (GWAC).

A description of corporate experience for similar contracts and/or projects accomplished within the last 5-7 years. The description must include where, when, and for whom each similar contract and/or project was performed and a brief description of each contract and/or project, including the size, scope, dollar value, and period of performance.

Information about whether or not your item is commercial and/or would need minor modifications.

If you are a provider or reseller of the Zignal Detection as a Service (DAAS) tool manufactured by Zignal Labs, Inc., please note that in your response. Zignal’s DaaS utilizes proprietary artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), advanced computer vision (CV), optical character recognition (OCR), natural language processing (NLP), geospatial, and object detection technologies to quickly filter through billions of daily social media and open-source posts, which addresses blind spots in data collection and threat monitoring.

Do not include proprietary, classified, confidential, or sensitive information in your response to this Sources Sought Notice. The Government reserves the right to use any information provided by respondents for any purpose deemed necessary and legally appropriate, including using technical information provided by respondents in any resultant solicitation. Responses to this Notice will not be returned. No hard copy or facsimile submissions will be accepted. Cover letters and extraneous materials (brochures, etc.) will not be considered. The Government will NOT accept requests for meetings or briefings. No phone calls or email concerning the status of the Request for Proposal (RFP) will be accepted prior to its release. Information and materials submitted in response to this notice WILL NOT be returned.

As a result of this notice, the Government MAY issue a Request for Proposal (RFP). There is no solicitation available at this time. However, should such a requirement materialize, no basis for claims against the Government will arise as a result of a response to this Sources Sought Notice, nor the Government’s use of such information as either part of our evaluation process, nor in developing specifications for any subsequent requirement. This sources sought notice is for market research purposes only.

7.0 Due Date

Capability Statements are due by email (no hard copies) no later than 2:00 p.m. Eastern Time on August 9, 2024. Late submissions may not receive full consideration in the Government’s decision process.

Send your response to email address whs.mc-alex.ad.mbx.essd-security-solicitation@mail.mil.

The email subject line should be titled “AI OSINT Software Support Services

HQ0034SEC08022024.”

Submissions sent to any person or email address other than the email address specified above may not receive full consideration in the Governments decision process.

END