I stepped into the FBI determined to pull it out of the past and give agents modern tools so they can protect communities better and faster. This piece walks through the technology overhaul, how artificial intelligence is being used across investigations and operations, the life-saving results we’ve already seen, and why accountability and partnerships made it happen. You’ll read specifics on child exploitation rescues, fingerprint advances, translation at scale, and the budget wins that paid for modernization.
The bureau arrived with a patchwork of outdated systems that simply could not keep pace with threats or data volumes. Imagine trying to power a 2025 battery with a car built in 1985, or running sophisticated investigations on a Commodore 64. Fixing that required wholesale change, not tweaks or temporary fixes.
We organized the work intentionally: an AI working group, a chief AI officer, an AI Review Board and an AI Champions Program to bring field feedback into every decision. We also forged direct partnerships with industry so the FBI didn’t try to reinvent every piece of the stack by itself. Those moves created an enterprise-level push that moved projects from pilot to production quickly.
“FBI DIRECTOR KASH PATEL SAYS BUREAU RAMPING UP AI TO COUNTER DOMESTIC, GLOBAL THREATS” is not a slogan; it’s the straightforward reality of what these programs are designed to do. AI became central to operations, not a gimmick, and the bureau now uses it as a force multiplier across multiple mission areas. That shift made investigators faster and more precise.
One of the clearest wins is child exploitation work, where technology helped locate and rescue children and bring predators to justice. Last year, the FBI identified and located 6,300 missing kids, a 30% increase, and arrested 2,000 abusers, a 20% increase, largely because the tools improved investigators’ reach and speed. In one Richmond case, facial recognition helped save 8- and 12-year-old children and led to an offender who will now serve 50 years in prison.
At the National Threat Operations Center, AI generates call transcriptions, drafts concise summaries and assigns lead values that highlight the highest-priority tips for intake examiners. That automated triage surfaced a credible plot and helped stop an attacker planning a mass shooting at a North Carolina preschool. Those are minutes and decisions where speed matters and technology removed friction from the response chain.
Fingerprint matching used to fail when criminals deliberately altered their prints by burning, cutting or otherwise damaging ridge detail. The Criminal Justice Information Services Division added an AI-enabled, real-time detection for altered fingerprints, and in 2025 that capability flagged 34 altered identities. Those hits translated into arrests of wanted persons, drug traffickers and fraudsters who would otherwise have slipped through automated checks.
We also faced terabytes of material in tense investigations, like the days after the Oct. 7, 2023 attacks, when the bureau had more than 75 terabytes to review and search warrant returns that could contain 180,000 messages each. Our translation models operate at roughly 80% accuracy, letting linguists target the 20% that needs human review instead of wasting time on everything. That kind of scale matters when analysts would otherwise spend weeks on a single return.
Using AI is about sharpening human investigators, not replacing them. Collecting data to sit in storage is like keeping Babe Ruth on the bench permanently, and these tools put the best players back in the game. When machines handle drudgery, trained agents can focus on judgment, interviews and courtroom work that still require human skill and discretion.
The FBI has made progress against fraud, scams and trafficking by combining in-house development and cooperative research with private partners to advance deepfake detection and other capabilities. Those collaborations accelerated real investigative tools and helped identify suspects hiding behind false personas. The public-private approach also sped deployment without the procurement delays that used to stall progress.
Accountability to taxpayers was a core part of the program: with an Enterprise AI assistant in place, the bureau cut $300 million in spending and identified more than $1.2 billion in contract ceiling savings. Those savings came from smarter procurement, consolidated services and better oversight of vendor work. Delivering results and trimming waste reinforced the argument that modernization pays for itself.
This effort changed how the bureau operates on a daily basis by making investigations faster, enabling lifesaving rescues, and improving the way we steward public resources. The tools are in the hands of brave people who still do the dangerous and essential work of safeguarding America, and technology has simply given them the edge they needed to be more effective every day.
