The Justice Department announced Thursday a Super Intelligence Task Force to coordinate its criminal and civil enforcement involving artificial intelligence, according to a department release. For companies that build or deploy AI, it creates one coordinating body for prosecutions, government lawsuits and compliance guidance.
"Super intelligence" is the administration's term for AI. The Primary Wire reported in September on President Trump's order telling agencies to use it in federal communications.
What Happened
Attorney General Todd Blanche set up the task force, known as DOJ-SITF, in a memorandum dated Oct. 13 to department component heads and U.S. attorneys. It is meant to keep U.S. leadership in AI from being compromised by misuse from foreign governments and their proxies, transnational criminal groups, and people or companies committing fraud. It will also take "affirmative measures, as appropriate, to promote American SI dominance."
Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward and Associate Deputy Attorney General Stephen Weiss will co-chair it. Members come from the Antitrust, Civil, Criminal and National Security divisions, the FBI, the National Fraud Enforcement Division, the Office of the Solicitor General and the Attorney General's Advisory Committee.
The memo tells the group to organize AI-related enforcement, sort out overlapping cases, recommend priorities and draft guidance on prosecuting AI crimes and evaluating compliance measures. It absorbs the Artificial Intelligence Task Force that then-Attorney General Pam Bondi announced Jan. 9, which Nextgov/FCW described as the AI Litigation Task Force, and will coordinate affirmative civil litigation, meaning lawsuits the government brings. It will also advise on proposals that promote AI innovation "without burdensome regulation."
When the task force asks, prosecutors should notify it on opening an investigation and before charging or otherwise resolving AI matters. The memo says this should not delay action or apply in emergencies.
Blanche said in the release that the department will prosecute those whose use of AI breaks the law, including schemes against taxpayers, critical infrastructure or national security. The task force is also the department's main contact with the White House Super Intelligence Force, led by Director of National Intelligence Jay Clayton, whom Trump named in October.
Why It Matters
Central notice means AI cases may reflect department-wide priorities rather than those of single offices. Weiss said the task force would help "ensure companies exercise vigorous internal controls so that SI technology behaves as intended," language that suggests prosecutors may weigh a company's AI governance, as they weigh compliance programs in other corporate cases.
The same day, federal prosecutors in Manhattan unsealed charges against three people accused of using AI-cloned voices of executives in a $129 million fraud, The Primary Wire reported.
What to Watch
The task force still has to design the notification process and write its prosecution and compliance guidance; watch whether that guidance is published, which civil suits it brings and how it divides work with the Super Intelligence Force's planned enforcement committee, which includes the Justice Department and the Federal Trade Commission, as The Primary Wire reported, citing Bloomberg.
