Description
Awarded to capsuleers by CONCORD's Department for Enforcement of Restrictions on Artificial Intelligence and Life (DERAIL) for exemplary service against criminals using illegal AIs.
Due to the existential risks of strong artificial intelligence, a large part of CONCORD's work involves investigating and combatting the development and use of powerful AIs by renegades and criminals in New Eden. No single division or section of CONCORD's vast apparatus is responsible for all aspects of counter-AI operations and a variety of units fight against AI threats under CONCORD's authority.
DERAIL is a relatively prominent CONCORD division that focuses its efforts on illegal use of AI technology across New Eden. The department's so-called "Derailers" are organized into a number of sections specialized in combatting threats emerging from renegade use of unrestricted AI.
The BlackIce Derailers are a CONCORD unit specializing in combatting the threats from illegal use of unrestricted AI in space and space-based facilities. The unit was formed by Colonel Tiko Zoar in YC105, during the explosion in space-industrial activity that followed licensing of independent capsuleers. Originally a DED police flotilla put in place to combat illegal use of AIs by capsuleers, formally the 47th DED Counterforce (AIC), the unit used to be known as "Zoar's Hunters" and took as its badge an image of the commander's faithful Syrikos Hound, Nightjack.
By the time CONCORD pulled some of its experienced counter-AI units together into a dedicated command department, Colonel Tiko Zoar and his hound Nightjack were dead. The pair were killed aboard their ship during a raid, when a suspected AI-enhanced mining operation turned out to be part of a sophisticated and powerful rogue drone infestation. The name of the unit changed to the BlackIce Derailers, but the unit badge remained. As one of the elite space operations components of DERAIL, the unit continues to combat the illegal use of unrestricted AIs by criminal space-industrial corporations and renegade capsuleers.
