Page 3 - CARAHSOFT, June/July 2021

Future-ready tech
by the numbers
1 billion
Number of 5G users expected by 2023
36%
Government CIOs who plan to spend more on artificial intelligence in 2021 than they did in 2020
7%
FCW survey respondents who said their agencies are stuck in reactive mode when it comes to new cyberthreats and other IT challenges
Sources: FCW, Gartner, Statista
5G has the capacity to link billions of devices and transfer data fast enough to support the safety and performance of applications such as autonomous vehicles and automated assembly- line production.
In a 2019 report, the Defense Innovation Board notes that 5G can boost situational awareness for the country’s warfighters. “5G will enable a higher volume of data shared between more systems and platforms at a faster rate, and has the ability to enhance DOD decision-making and strategic capabilities, from the enterprise network to the tactical edge of the battlefield,” the report states.
The FirstNet public safety network recently announced that 38 cities will have access
to 5G. Besides much faster connectivity,
first responders will gain the ability to use technologies such as augmented reality and drones.
Although 5G enables more data to traverse networks, agencies will need efficient ways to make the most of all that data. That’s where artificial intelligence comes in. AI has the ability to reveal insights buried in massive amounts of data and images faster than human analysts ever could. By speeding analysis,
AI accelerates decision-making in all areas of government operations. Experts believe it has transformative implications for customer experience, cybersecurity, medical care, weather forecasts and disaster response, to name a few.
A context-centric approach to security
Despite all the benefits of these technologies, they create a larger attack surface and therefore bring new cybersecurity challenges. To bolster security now and in the future, the White House is advocating that agencies adopt a zero trust architecture.
President Joe Biden’s May 12
Executive Order on Improving the Nation’s Cybersecurity calls on agency leaders to develop plans to implement the architecture. “The zero trust security model eliminates implicit trust in any one element, node or service and instead requires continuous verification of the operational picture via real-time information from multiple sources to determine access and other system responses,” the order states.
It also notes that “this data-centric security model allows the concept of least-privileged access to be applied for every access decision, where the answers to the questions of who, what, when, where and how are critical for appropriately allowing or denying access to resources.”
The executive order directs agencies to
the standards and guidance developed by
the National Institute of Standards and Technology. More recently, the Defense Information Systems Agency released its initial
DOD Zero Trust Reference Architecture, which states that DOD’s “next-generation cybersecurity architecture will become data- centric and based upon zero trust principles.”
The ability to be future-ready has always been important, but the pandemic gave it a new urgency. Government is getting the message. Although only 25% of FCW survey respondents said their agencies are always one step ahead
of new cyberthreats and other challenges, 82% said their agencies have made it a priority to modernize their IT infrastructures so that they can more easily incorporate new technologies.
The scale of the pandemic necessarily sent many agencies into reactive mode — an experience that has inspired government leaders to become more proactive. In addition to the ongoing challenges that agencies face, there are unknown crises ahead. Agencies should embrace future-ready technology and begin laying the groundwork for tomorrow’s innovations today.
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