Pentagon: Maven AI overreliance, outdated data contributed to school strike killing 123

Bloomberg reported that Pentagon investigators determined a U.S. airstrike on an Iranian school that killed 123 children resulted from multiple failures: the Maven Smart System was fed outdated intelligence about a site that had been a military compound but had openly operated as a school since 2018, and Centcom personnel relied too heavily on the AI's output. Hegseth cut civilian harm mitigation staffing at Centcom by roughly 90%, reducing that team from 10 to 1, and no civilian harm mitigation member reviewed the Minab site before the strike. Palantir, whose software runs Maven, said it 'is not responsible for the underlying data nor identifying intelligence deficiencies' and denies its software was at fault. After the strike, Palantir built new Maven capabilities to re-review underlying intelligence and flag inconsistencies. Hegseth allegedly buried the error report for months.