Ukraine’s deadly AI training platform for drone tech opens to UK companies

KYIV, Ukraine — The British Ministry of Defence has struck a partnership with Ukraine’s Avengers AI Labs, an information-rich platform built to train AI for battlefield drones, marking the first time that Kyiv has opened up its trove of wartime data to an outside government, according to officials in London.

The announcement comes a month after U.K. Prime Minister Andy Burnham signed an AI deal with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy while visiting Kyiv alongside other allies to honor Ukraine’s independence day and pledge continued support to the war-torn nation.

“Ukraine is the frontline of freedom for us all. On my recent visit to Kyiv, I saw first-hand the courage and resilience of the Ukrainian people,” U.K. Defence Secretary Wes Streeting said in a statement on Friday.

“I also saw the extraordinary innovation which is allowing them to repel Putin’s illegal and unprovoked invasion.”

“This world-first access to real battlefield data will allow British companies to continue pushing the frontier of defence innovation, deterring our enemies and making us safer at home as well as further strengthening Ukraine,” Streeting said.

Ukraine has shared its combat-derived AI training data with allies in the past, but this is the first time that Kyiv has granted a foreign country access to the machine-learning infrastructure driving its rapid AI innovations seen across the front.

Avengers AI Labs holds an annotated dataset of more than 5 million battlefield frames, plus sensor data covering millions of object detections — including tanks, artillery, air defense, infantry, Shahed drones, reconnaissance UAVs, and more) — built mainly from Ukraine’s DELTA battle-management system , according to a release by Ukrainian officials.

Data is anonymized and released on a delay to avoid endangering personnel still fighting, according to Ukraine’s Defence Ministry. U.K. companies also work inside a secure perimeter that doesn’t allow them to download the underlying dataset, according to Ukraine’s MOD.

The British defense ministry is now inviting up to a dozen companies to submit proposals for how they would use the platform, especially to develop tech that would enable full functionality even when communications are degraded or satellite navigation is unavailable.

“It is exactly the kind of practical partnership the Taskforce was set up to drive, supporting our ally Ukraine while strengthening sovereign capability here in Britain,” U.K. AI Minister Kanishka Narayan said in Friday’s statement.

Katie Livingstone is the Ukraine correspondent for Defense News and Military Times. Based in Kyiv, she has covered Russia's full-scale invasion since its first days. She is a former Fulbright fellow whose award-winning work has appeared in outlets across Europe and the U.S.

乌克兰基辅——据伦敦官员称，英国国防部已与乌克兰复仇者人工智能实验室（Avengers AI Labs）建立合作关系。该实验室是一个信息丰富的平台，旨在训练战场无人机的人工智能。这标志着基辅首次向外部政府开放其丰富的战时数据。

一个月前，英国首相安迪·伯纳姆与其他盟友一同访问基辅，与乌克兰总统弗拉基米尔·泽连斯基签署了一项人工智能协议，以纪念乌克兰独立日并承诺继续支持这个饱受战争蹂躏的国家。

英国国防大臣韦斯·斯特里廷周五在一份声明中表示：“乌克兰是我们所有人的自由前线。在我最近访问基辅期间，我亲眼目睹了乌克兰人民的勇气和韧性。”

“我还看到了他们展现出的非凡创新能力，正是这种创新能力使他们能够击退普京非法且无端的入侵。”

斯特里廷表示：“这项全球首创的获取真实战场数据的途径，将使英国公司能够继续推进国防创新前沿，威慑我们的敌人，使我们的国内更安全，并进一步加强乌克兰。”

乌克兰过去曾与盟友分享其从战斗中获得的 AI 训练数据，但这是基辅首次允许外国访问其机器学习基础设施，该基础设施推动了乌克兰在前线各地的 AI 快速创新。

据乌克兰官员发布的消息，复仇者联盟人工智能实验室拥有超过 500 万帧带注释的战场图像数据集，以及涵盖数百万目标检测的传感器数据（包括坦克、火炮、防空系统、步兵、沙赫德无人机、侦察无人机等），这些数据主要来自乌克兰的 DELTA 作战管理系统。

据乌克兰国防部称，数据经过匿名化处理并延迟发布，以避免危及仍在作战的人员。乌克兰国防部还表示，英国公司也在安全边界内工作，无法下载底层数据集。

英国国防部现在邀请多达十几家公司提交提案，说明他们将如何使用该平台，特别是开发即使在通信中断或卫星导航不可用的情况下也能实现全部功能的技术。

英国人工智能部长卡尼什卡·纳拉扬在周五的声明中表示：“这正是工作组成立的初衷，旨在推动务实的伙伴关系，支持我们的盟友乌克兰，同时加强英国自身的主权能力。”

凯蒂·利文斯通是《防务新闻》和《军事时报》的乌克兰特派记者。她常驻基辅，自俄罗斯全面入侵乌克兰之初便开始报道此事。她曾是富布赖特学者，其获奖作品发表于欧洲和美国的多家媒体。