Posted by Mike Boyle, VP Sales, TCC

I recently read a good article on the StateTech Magazine about four trends to watch in state and local government. https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2022/12/tech-trends-4-state-and-local-government-trends-watch-2023?cm_ven=Email&cm_cat=ET_Promotional&cm_pla=MKT61857adu0000P0000&etsi=16185569&etsu=920225538&cm_ite=MKT61857_20230103_CAMPAIGN_TECHMAG_STATETECH_0-0-0-0-LOOKALIKE-0-0-Y_CTRL_E&cm_ven=Email&cm_cat=ET_Promotional&cm_pla=MKT61857adu0000P0000&etsi=16185564&etsu=920225538&cm_ite=MKT61857_20230103_CAMPAIGN_TECHMAG_STATETECH_0-0-0-0-‘SUBSCRIBERS-0-0-Y_CTRL_D

The first trend mentioned in the article is “modern workspace management”.  James Collins, general manager for state and local government at Microsoft, and former CIO of the state of Delaware states “We’re coming to that time when instead of deploying individual devices with individual operating systems, people just connect to a server in the cloud from whatever device they’re using, and it gives them a session,” Collins says. “It looks like their familiar desktop and allows them to do everything they need to.”

This allows government employees to access the resources they need from anywhere at any time, in a familiar manner, increasing productivity and worker satisfaction.

The second trend noted is “identity and access management”, and it is a trend for a second year in a row. The article states “Identity and access management solutions generally provide employees with a single sign-on, empowering them to access vital solutions for their day-to-day work. Government IT administrators can seamlessly provision these resources and allocate access to specific employees.”

Better identify and access management solutions mean that administrators gain visibility into devices and applications coordinated through modern workspace management, and employees can log into a centralized portal for authentication while experiencing the same familiar procedures for logging in to a digital workspace.

“Hybrid cloud and data management” is the third trend discussed in this article. The hybrid cloud, where some data is stored on-premises, and some is stored in the cloud, has become popular to some agencies looking to move some operations to the cloud. With this solution, state employees are able to access data stored in the cloud on demand from any location, potentially producing remarkable efficiencies in their work.

Digital workspaces and identity management solutions work across cloud service providers to pool solutions from various resources. These types of solutions can potentially enhance agencies’ operational efficiency by providing scalability.

The final trend discussed in this article is “security information and event management”, or SIEM.  Security is of the utmost importance for all information systems, especially those that house sensitive data.

The article states “To help secure these resources, agencies are increasingly turning to security information and event management, a centralized means of collecting events and alerts. SIEM aggregates and analyzes data from multiple systems to identify anomalous behavior and flag potential threats. These capabilities are particularly helpful when orchestrating resources across various service providers in a hybrid cloud environment.”

Among state and local governments, “different organizations have procured and are using different products and even technologies,” says Jim Richberg, Fortinet’s field CISO for the public sector. “SIEM becomes especially useful in those kinds of highly varied environments: It tends to be designed to deal with input from different kinds of platforms and from different vendors. SIEM does a good job of pulling together different kinds of data.”

Together, these four trends indicate that state governments will capitalize on the power of centralized unified account management, while incorporating more hybrid components into their digital workspaces.

To find out more about TCC and our work with State government please visit our website https://www.e-tcc.com/.

Posted by Mike Boyle, VP Sales, TCC

A recent article on the State Tech Magazine website indicates that state and local governments are showing increased confidence in cloud security which is good news for providers. https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2023/02/traditionally-reluctant-governments-have-increased-trust-cloud-security?cm_ven=Email&cm_cat=ET_Promotional&cm_pla=MKT63191adu0000P0000&etsi=16246097&etsu=920225538&cm_ite=MKT63191_20230214_CAMPAIGN_TECHMAG_STATETECH_0-0-0-0-NONPURCH-0-0-Y_CTRL_C&cm_ven=Email&cm_cat=ET_Promotional&cm_pla=MKT63191adu0000P0000&etsi=16246098&etsu=920225538&cm_ite=MKT63191_20230214_CAMPAIGN_TECHMAG_STATETECH_0-0-0-0-SUBSCRIBERS-0-0-Y_CTRL_D

The article indicates that during the pandemic lockdowns, citizens could not enter government facilities to transact business, and state and local governments began adopting more cloud based services to meet the demands of their constituents.

State and local government agencies had been wary of adopting cloud solutions, primarily due to security concerns.  “Government agencies hold confidential data, and they could suffer a crisis of public trust if that data leaked. But agencies have gained more trust in cloud service providers in recent years.”

The article states “State and local government agencies can undertake an accounting of their data and make determinations about what data, if any, should go into the cloud. Major cloud service providers have taken tremendous steps to safeguard data, and often these steps exceed the capabilities of stand-alone government organizations.”

The numbers provided in the article support this viewpoint, stating “A recent survey by the National Association of State Chief Information Officers found that 89 percent of state CIOs say hybrid cloud is ideal for their operations.”

Agencies can also take proactive measures to be sure their cloud service providers take additional steps to ensure security such as “specific security measures that protect cloud-based systems, particularly email, which often serves as a front door for attackers.”

With these security measures in place, state and local governments can continue to accelerate the pace of digital transformation and continue to embrace the cloud.

To find out more about TCC and our work with State government please visit our website https://www.e-tcc.com/.