II 

118TH CONGRESS 

1ST SESSION S. 3504 

To establish a course of education and pilot program on authentication 

of digital content provenance for certain Department of Defense media 

content, and for other purposes. 

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES 

DECEMBER 13, 2023 

Mr. PETERS introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred 

to the Committee on Armed Services 

A BILL 

To establish a course of education and pilot program on 

authentication of digital content provenance for certain 

Department of Defense media content, and for other 

purposes. 

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 

3 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 

4 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Digital Defense Con5 tent Provenance Act of 2023’’. 

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1 SEC. 2. COURSE OF EDUCATION AND PILOT PROGRAM ON 

2 AUTHENTICATION OF DIGITAL CONTENT 

3 PROVENANCE FOR CERTAIN DEPARTMENT 

4 OF DEFENSE MEDIA CONTENT. 

5 (a) COURSE OF EDUCATION.— 

6 (1) IN GENERAL.—Not later than one year 

7 after the date of the enactment of this Act, the Sec8 retary of Defense, acting through the Director of the 

9 Defense Media Activity, shall establish a course of 

10 education at the Defense Information School, the 

11 purpose of which shall be to provide instruction on 

12 the practical concepts and skills needed by public af13 fairs, audiovisual, visual information, and records 

14 management specialists to understand the following: 

15 (A) Digital content provenance for applica16 ble Department media content. 

17 (B) The challenges posed to missions and 

18 operations of the Department by a digital con19 tent forgery. 

20 (C) How industry open technical standards 

21 may be used to authenticate the digital content 

22 provenance of applicable Department media 

23 content. 

24 (2) MATTERS.—The course of education under 

25 paragraph (1) shall cover the following matters: 

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1 (A) The challenges to missions and oper2 ations of the Department posed by a digital 

3 content forgery. 

4 (B) The development of industry open 

5 technical standards for authenticating the dig6 ital content provenance of applicable Depart7 ment media content. 

8 (C) Hands-on training on techniques to 

9 record secure and authenticated digital content 

10 to document and communicate relevant themes 

11 and messages of the Department. 

12 (D) Training on— 

13 (i) the use of industry open technical 

14 standards for authenticating digital con15 tent provenance in the completion of post16 production tasks; and 

17 (ii) the transmission of applicable De18 partment media content in both oper19 ational and nonoperational environments. 

20 (E) Such other matters as the Director of 

21 the Defense Media Activity considers appro22 priate. 

23 (3) REPORT.—Not later than one year after the 

24 date of the establishment of the course of education 

25 under paragraph (1), the Director of the Defense 

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1 Media Activity shall submit to the Committees on 

2 Armed Services of the House of Representatives and 

3 the Senate a report on the following: 

4 (A) The status of the development of a 

5 curriculum for such course of education. 

6 (B) The implementation plan of the Direc7 tor for such course of education, including the 

8 following: 

9 (i) The expertise and qualifications of 

10 the personnel of the Department respon11 sible for teaching such course of education. 

12 (ii) The list of sources consulted or 

13 otherwise used to develop the curriculum 

14 for such course of education. 

15 (iii) A description of the industry open 

16 technical standards referred to in para17 graph (1)(C). 

18 (iv) The status of the implementation 

19 of such course of education. 

20 (C) The resources available to the Director 

21 to carry out this subsection and whether the 

22 Director requires any additional resources to 

23 carry out this subsection. 

24 (b) PILOT PROGRAM ON IMPLEMENTING DIGITAL

25 CONTENT PROVENANCE STANDARDS.— 

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1 (1) PILOT PROGRAM.—Not later than one year 

2 after the date of the enactment of this Act, the Di3 rector of the Defense Media Activity shall carry out 

4 a pilot program to assess the feasibility and advis5 ability of implementing industry open technical 

6 standards for digital content provenance for official 

7 photographs and videos of the Department of De8 fense publicly released by the Defense Visual Infor9 mation Distribution Service, or any successor oper10 ation, and other distribution platforms, systems, and 

11 services used by the Department of Defense (in this 

12 subsection referred to as the ‘‘pilot program’’). 

13 (2) ELEMENTS.—In carrying out the pilot pro14 gram, the Director of the Defense Media Activity 

15 shall— 

16 (A) establish a process for using industry 

17 open technical standards to verify the digital 

18 content provenance of applicable Department 

19 media content; 

20 (B) apply technology solutions that com21 port with industry open technical standard for 

22 digital content provenance to photographs and 

23 videos of the Department publicly released as 

24 described in paragraph (1) after the date of the 

25 enactment of this Act; 

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1 (C) assess the feasibility and advisability of 

2 applying an industry open technical standard 

3 for digital content provenance to historical vis4 ual information records of the Department 

5 stored at the Defense Visual Information 

6 Records Center; and 

7 (D) develop and apply measure of effec8 tiveness for the implementation of the pilot pro9 gram. 

10 (3) CONSULTATION.—In carrying out the pilot 

11 program, the Director of the Defense Media Activity 

12 may consult with federally funded research and de13 velopment centers, entities within private industry, 

14 institutions of higher education, and such other enti15 ties as the Director considers appropriate. 

16 (4) TERMINATION.—The pilot program shall 

17 terminate on January 1, 2027. 

18 (5) REPORT.— 

19 (A) IN GENERAL.—Not later than January 

20 1, 2026, the Director of the Defense Media Ac21 tivity shall submit to the Committees on Armed 

22 Services of the House of Representatives and 

23 the Senate a report on the pilot program. 

24 (B) ELEMENTS.—The report under sub25 paragraph (A) shall include the following: 

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1 (i) The findings of the Director with 

2 respect to the pilot program. 

3 (ii) The name of each entity the Di4 rector consulted with pursuant to para5 graph (3) in carrying out the pilot pro6 gram. 

7 (iii) An assessment by the Director of 

8 the effectiveness of the pilot program. 

9 (iv) A recommendation by the Direc10 tor as to whether the pilot program should 

11 be made permanent. 

12 (c) DEFINITIONS.—In this section: 

13 (1) The term ‘‘applicable Department media 

14 content’’ means any media holding generated, 

15 stored, or controlled by the Defense Media Activity. 

16 (2) The term ‘‘digital content forgery’’ means 

17 the use of emerging technologies, including artificial 

18 intelligence and machine learning techniques, to fab19 ricate or manipulate audio, visual, or text content 

20 with the intent to mislead. 

21 (3) The term ‘‘digital content provenance’’ 

22 means the verifiable chronology of the origin and 

23 history of an image, video, audio recording, elec24 tronic document, or other form of digital content. 

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