The Air Force is reassuring Congress that its system for posting, processing and disseminating intelligence information is not overstepping its bounds.

In a report to Congress last month, the Air Force told lawmakers that the Distributed Common Ground/Surface System Analysis and Reporting Team (DART) is filling a vital role in intelligence sharing and is one of the key factors in the service’s evolution in capability.

Congress requested the report from the Air Force in the fiscal 2015 Defense Authorization Act, over concerns that DART was stepping beyond the appropriate functions for the system “unduly broadening” the mission and “distracting” from the operation.

The Air Force responded by saying that DART enhances near-real time intelligence by providing context to the data gathered. This allows the intelligence community to rapidly re-task its assets and identify the identities of adversaries by quickly melding intelligence.

DART focuses on “time-dominant fusion.” That fusion is a rapid analysis of what is new and what is known in intelligence data. Analysts use workflow tools to sift through large amounts of data to find new locations for imagery collection to find adversaries, Air Force Col. Jason M. Brown and Lt. Col. David Vernal wrote in an article for the U.S. Geospatial Intelligence Foundation.

Now that the Air Force’s Distributed Common Ground/Surface System (DCGS) is in its 12^th year, Congress is checking in on how the information sharing program has progressed and making sure it stays on its mission path before continuing to fund it.

The Defense Authorization Act requires the Air Force to outline a proposed plan of action and milestone to move the program to its desired form. The plan is supposed to include anticipated costs and manpower requirements.

The report states that the Air Force is in the process of developing a plan and will make it available “at a future date.”

Air Force did offer that the plan will focus on professionalizing its intelligence analysis through training, tradecraft and collaboration. The plan also will balance and restore analytic competence and leverage technological advances to increase capacity and relevance.

AF DCGS has seen a 2,300 percent increase in its intelligence missions per day, the report stated. Those come through numerous aircraft including U-2s, MQ-1s and MC-12s. In 2014, AF DCGS personnel analyzed almost 445,000 hours of full-motion video. It also reviewed more than 450,000 still images and managed about 20 terabytes of data daily as part of 30,000 tasked missions.

The report comes as Defense Secretary Ash Carter recently announced he will invest in cyber and intelligence for the Air Force’s 2017 budget request.

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