Candice Ling, senior vice president of Microsoft’s federal government business, announced the launch in a Tuesday blog post, highlighting the data safety measures of the service and its potential uses for productivity and innovation. 

“Azure OpenAI in Azure Government enables agencies with stringent security and compliance requirements to utilize this industry-leading generative AI service at the unclassified level,” Ling’s post said.

The announcement comes as the federal government is increasingly experimenting with and adopting AI technologies. Agencies have reported hundreds of use cases for the technology while also crafting their own internal policies and guidance for use of generative AI tools.

Ling also announced that the company is submitting Azure OpenAI for federal cloud services authorizations that, if approved, would allow higher-impact data to be used with the system. 

Microsoft is submitting the service for authorization for FedRAMP’s “high” baseline, which is reserved for cloud systems using high-impact, sensitive, unclassified data like heath care, financial or law enforcement information. It will also submit the system for authorization for the Department of Defense’s Impact Levels 4 and 5, Ling said. Those data classification levels for DOD include controlled unclassified information, non-controlled unclassified information and non-public, unclassified national security system data.

In an interview with FedScoop, a Microsoft executive said the availability of the technology in Azure Government is going to bring government customers capabilities expected from GPT-4 — the fourth version of Open AI’s large language models — in “a more highly regulated environment.”

The executive said the company received feedback from government customers who were experimenting with smaller models and open source models but wanted to be able to use the technology on more sensitive workloads.

Over 100 agencies have already deployed the technology in the commercial environment, the executive said, “and the majority of those customers are asking for the same capability in Azure Government.” 

Ling underscored data security measures for Azure OpenAI in the blog, calling it “a fundamental aspect” of the service. 

“This includes ensuring that prompts and proprietary data aren’t used to further train the model,” Ling wrote. “While Azure OpenAI Service can use in-house data as allowed by the agency, inputs  and outcomes are not made available to Microsoft or others using the service.”

That means embeddings and training data aren’t available to other customers, nor are they used to train other models or used to improve the company’s or third-party services. 

According to Ling’s blog, the technology is already being used for a tool being developed by the National Institutes of Health’s National Library of Medicine. In collaboration with the National Cancer Institute, the agency is working on a large language model-based tool, called TrialGPT, that will match patients with clinical trials.

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In a series of panel discussions at the “Federal Innovation Series: Leading in the Era of AI” event, agency officials and technology experts from Microsoft touched on ways government agencies are harnessing AI to enhance mission support, ensure responsible innovation, and bolster cybersecurity. The event was presented by FedScoop and sponsored by Microsoft.

Candice Ling, senior vice president of Microsoft’s federal business, kicked off the conference with a call to action for government agencies to embark on a transformational journey through a process of co-innovation and collaboration to modernize government operations. Ling highlighted Microsoft’s commitment to responsible and ethical AI solutions to safeguard government systems. She stressed how the company’s principles for responsible AI — including accountability, inclusiveness, reliability, safety, fairness, transparency, and privacy and security — and Microsoft’s experience working with federal agencies can help agencies capitalize on AI to innovate faster and more effectively.

Eileen Vidrine, chief data and AI officer at the Department of Air Force, outlined the department’s goals to provide the necessary framework to “operationalize data and AI for decision advantage” and to be “AI-ready by 2025 and AI-competitive by 2027.” She also reiterated the importance of partnerships across the Air Force, the Defense Department, industry and academia to keep pace with AI’s potential.

Federal Reserve System Chief Innovation Officer Sunayna Tuteja spoke about the importance of problem-solving and the need for appropriate guardrails when designing AI solutions. She encouraged government leaders in the audience to understand but get comfortable with the risks of AI and embrace innovation’s inherent uncertainty. The public sector doesn’t spend enough time thinking about the risk of not doing something, she told the audience.

Chris DeRusha, Federal CISO at OMB, Ginny Badanes, senior director at Microsoft Democracy Forward, and Glen Johnson, chief technology officer at the Department of State, delved into AI’s role in revolutionizing government cybersecurity. AI dramatically expands the capacity of federal agencies to detect anomalies, analyze data, and automate responses to cyber threats, they said.

Pritha Mehra, CIO of the U.S. Postal Service, revealed how USPS is leveraging AI to provide “accurate predictions of where your package is, when it’s going to be delivered and within the exact time.” AI is also helping USPS to document and rewrite legacy code, automate customer calls concerning passport applications and increase its ability to detect fraud, she said.

Brian Abrahamson, associate laboratory director and chief digital officer at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, urged attendees to educate themselves on the possibilities of AI. He emphasized the importance of pilot projects and shared examples of AI’s transformative applications.

Michael Pencina, chief data scientist at Duke Health and vice dean for data science at the Duke University School of Medicine, joined Jennifer Rostami, assistant commissioner at the General Services Administration’s Technology Transformation Services unit, to discuss the need for ground rules around AI. They underscored the importance of ensuring transparency, trustworthiness, and fairness in applying AI in government. Building trust through governance frameworks and developing blueprints for employees and partners are critical steps public sector leaders need to take, they said.

Also speaking at the event were Patricia O’Neill-Brown, senior advisor at the Defense Intelligence; Kimberly Sablon, principal director for trusted AI and autonomy at the Department of Defense; and James-Christian Blockwood, executive vice president at the Partnership for Public Service. Adding additional perspective from Microsoft were Corporate Vice President, U.S. Government Affairs Fred Humphries; Microsoft Federal General Manager Brian Keith; Director for AI Public Policy Danyelle Solomon; Federal Security CTO Steve Faehl; and Vice President Federal Civilian Heidi Kobylski.

The innovation summit came on the heels of a landmark executive order focused on artificial intelligence and new OMB guidance issued by the Biden administration earlier in the week.

Also noted during the event was a new research report, “Gauging the impact of Generative AI on Government,” released by FedScoop last month, which examined how federal agency leaders are preparing to adopt AI. Microsoft underwrote the report.

Learn more about how AI can support government services from Microsoft.

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“Government customers have signaled a strong, strong demand for the latest AI tools, especially for what we call our [Microsoft 365] co-pilot,” Candice Ling, vice president of Microsoft Federal, told FedScoop before the announcement. 

“By announcing the roadmap, we’re giving the agencies a heads up on how they can be prepared to adopt the capabilities that they want so much,” she added. “At the same time for those who haven’t done so, migrating to the cloud is a key first step to building and also looking at data governance, so that we can fully take advantage of the AI capabilities.”

Some of the key AI services that Microsoft will roll out in the coming months include: Azure OpenAI generative AI services for government, including GPT-3.5 Turbo and GPT-4 models; Azure OpenAI service for classified workloads; Teams Premium with intelligent recap in Microsoft 365 Government; Microsoft 365 Copilot update for government; and Open Source LLMs in Azure Government.

In a blog post shared exclusively with FedScoop that will publish Tuesday, Microsoft noted the higher levels of security and compliance required by government agencies when handling sensitive data. “To enable these agencies to fully realize the potential of AI, over the coming months Microsoft will begin rolling out new AI capabilities and infrastructure solutions across both our Azure commercial and Azure Government environments,” the blog post stated.

The new Azure OpenAI Service in Azure Government will enable the latest generative AI capabilities, including GPT-3.5 Turbo and GPT-4 models, for customers requiring higher levels of compliance and isolation. The product will be available in the first quarter of 2024.

Microsoft this summer will preview Azure OpenAI Services in its “air-gapped classified clouds to select national security customers.” The generative AI platform will be brought to its isolated classified cloud environment, enabling national security leaders and operators to use critical AI capabilities to analyze highly sensitive data anytime and anywhere.

The tech giant’s Teams Premium service with intelligent recap of meetings is expected to roll out to government users during the spring of 2024. Intelligent recap uses AI to help users summarize meeting content and focus on key elements through AI-generated meeting notes and tasks.

“So every agency, their needs are going to be different. But the theme that we’re hearing across the board is how we can transform the way they can deliver services to citizens that could really drive critical outcomes,” Ling told FedScoop. 

Ling added that consumers don’t have to be advanced programmers or data scientists to use the systems. “It’s anyone being able to ask the question about your data and being able to process information quite quickly. So anyone can do that now. And that can transform how the agencies work, right?”

Microsoft 365 Copilot for government is also expected to roll out during the summer of 2024, giving access to a “transformational AI assistant in GCC, bringing generative AI to our comprehensive productivity suite for a host of government users,” according to the blog post.

The Seattle-based company will announce on Tuesday that it has enabled access to open source AI model Llama-2 via the Azure Machine Learning catalog in Azure Government. The company recognizes that “some mission requirements benefit from smaller generative AI models” in addition to its own OpenAI models.

Microsoft’s AI rollout builds upon the June launch of its Azure OpenAI Service for the government to allow federal agencies to use powerful language models to run within the company’s cloud service for U.S. government agencies, Azure Government.

Microsoft in July also received FedRAMP high authorization, giving federal agencies who manage some of the government’s most sensitive data access to powerful language models including ChatGPT.

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The executive has over two decades of leadership experience in the tech sector and was previously vice president at Microsoft’s public sector division. In her new role, Ling’s priorities are expected to include using the company’s partnership with tech giant OpenAI to help agencies adopt artificial intelligence tools.

Ling’s appointment follows the departure of Rick Wagner, who last week stepped down as Microsoft Federal president.

In addition, the Redmond, Washington-based software giant has also named Roger Heinz to lead Microsoft’s communication sales and delivery team amid a slight reshuffle of its Strategic Missions and Technologies team, according to Microsoft job announcements shared with FedScoop.

The leadership reshuffle comes as Microsoft faces intense intense scrutiny after hackers based in China breached the email accounts of senior U.S. officials, an operation that utilized a flaw in a Microsoft product and was discovered thanks to a logging feature that costs customers extra. Biden administration officials, security researchers and members of Congress have questioned the company’s commitment to security in the aftermath of the hack and why Microsoft is upselling customers for core security features.

“In this new era of government, we are dedicated to and laser-focused on accelerating AI adoption in support of your mission,” Ling is expected to say of her appointment, according to remarks shared with FedScoop. “We are always honored to stand by you, and it is a wonderful privilege for us to lead the charge in the AI revolution together.” 

Ling has been with Microsoft for five years including two years as Microsoft Asia Government lead in Singapore and three years on its federal team in Virginia. Ling previously spent 19 years with Canadian IT consulting company CGI in various leadership roles.

The reshuffle also comes as Microsoft works to expand the services it provides to U.S. government agencies, including through the provision of artificial intelligence-assisted cloud technology.

Last month the technology giant launched its new Azure OpenAI Service for government, which the company says will allow federal agencies to use powerful language models including ChatGPT while adhering to stringent security and compliance standards.

That service is intended to allow government departments to adapt models including GPT-3 and GPT-4 for specific tasks, including content generation, summarization, semantic search, and natural language-to-code translation.

In September 2021, Microsoft combined its U.S. federal business unit with its Azure cloud team to create a new subsidiary as part of a reorganization of the technology giant’s U.S. public sector operation.

Microsoft has a long track record working with government agencies, and for nearly two years was embroiled in a legal dispute with Amazon after winning the Pentagon’s JEDI cloud contract.

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