The government sector has historically been slow to adopt and keep up with new technologies. But as we recently entered a new decade, change is bound to happen. Here are four ways technology looks to transform and shape our government over the next decade.
One- Better defense for cyber threats
Cybercrimes saw rapid growth throughout the 2010s. The government will need to take serious action to stop cyber criminals from taking advantage of U.S. citizens, businesses, and even the government itself. Cybersecurity will need to be addressed more proactively vs reactively to help make sure these attackers do not increase in the public sector.
Two- Cryptocurrency will need to be ‘somewhat’ regulated
The 2010s brought the world cryptocurrencies and, moving into the next decade, we have not even scratched the surface of what cryptocurrencies and blockchain are capable of. While it’s hard to tell what exactly the government will do in terms of regulations, one thing is certain, they will need to crack down on scam or fraud crypto companies.
Three- Fraud will be weaponized
As the world goes into the next decade we are relying more and more on digital communication. And with that reliance on digital platforms it opens the door for security issues. We saw this with the 2016 U.S. Presidential election with Russia. The government needs to take appropriate steps to ensure threats like the one we saw in 2016 don’t happen again.
Four- Algorithms will be governed by laws
Algorithms are used across most platforms- Google, Instagram, Facebook, Amazon, etc. They use information from their users to market to them based on activity, and historic data is great- to an extent. Many algorithms could unfairly target users based on subsets of information. For example, facial recognition can unfairly create biases based on specific physical attributes. As we move into this new decade, lawmakers will continue to evaluate these complex algorithms to ensure companies are not using data to discriminate.
Security, streamlining, and effective and efficient digital experience will be the overarching themes for the next decade for technology trends within the government space. Agencies will need to be able to pivot to meet the ever-evolving digital space in order to start the new decade off right.
About the Author: Taylor Genter Taylor is the Marketing Specialist at Extract with experience in data analytics, graphic design, and both digital and social media marketing. She earned her Bachelor of Business Administration degree in Marketing at the University of Wisconsin- Whitewater. Taylor enjoys analyzing people’s behaviors and attitudes to find out what motivates them, and then curating better ways to communicate with them.