Technically Speaking

The modern workplace is a far cry from spaces of the past. Banks of private offices gave way to an open concept fad that’s morphed into a hybrid of spaces, including personal desks surrounded by pony walls, hot and hotel desks, and collaboration areas. COVID-19 threw workplace and space management into turmoil, but the return-to-work movement is underway. As employees come back to offices, stores, factories, and other businesses, the need for privacy in the workplace again takes center stage.

2020 was a transformative year for public sector IT. Accelerated by necessity, agencies rapidly scaled and secured their digital ecosystems to accommodate a newly remote workforce. Against this backdrop, significant cybersecurity hacks revealed continued vulnerabilities in the federal supply chain and state and local IT infrastructures. Looking forward there is much work to be done. A new administration, new regulations and continued reliance on the cloud will shape public sector IT through 2021.

This month, DLT Chief Data Scientist Sherry Bennett sat down with Informatica Cheif Strategist for the Public Sector, Mike Anderson to discuss his views on the future of big data in the public sector. Read the exclusive interview below to hear directly from one of the industry's top big data leaders.

On January 1, 2021, the House and Senate overrode President Trump’s veto of H.R.6395, the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for Fiscal Year 2021, rendering the bill law. The FY2021 NDAA includes the National Artificial Intelligence Initiative Act (NAIIA), one of the most ambitious attempts by Congress to date, seeking to establish the United States leadership in artificial intelligence (AI).

Mixed-use spaces – used by public sector agencies for different purposes – or even mixed-use cities present unique challenges for workplace managers under the cloud of COVID. Unlike single-use facilities, mixed-use spaces may see much larger groups of people come and go. Monitoring the health of every individual is likely impossible without strict contact tracing standards.

Article by Rick F. van der Lans