Public Sector Tech Outlook: 2024 Predictions for AI, Cybersecurity and FedRAMP Evolution

Tech Transforms, sponsored by Dynatrace

What will 2024 have in store for technology development and regulation? Our hosts, Carolyn Ford and Mark Senell, sat down with Roger Cressey, Partner at Mountain Wave Ventures, Ross Nodurft, Executive Director of the Alliance for Digital Innovation and Willie Hicks, Public Sector Chief Technologist for Dynatrace, to discuss their 2024 predictions. Discover what the experts think will occur next year in terms of FedRAMP, AI regulation, Zero Trust and user experience.

Key Topics

• 00:00 Revamping FedRAMP in 2024 leads to changes.
• 06:40 Industry requests FedRAMP High; concerns about changes.
• 08:20 Anticipating challenges but aiming for improvement.
• 11:13 Pushing for reciprocity in government technology solutions.
• 15:15 Ensuring human control in AI military use.
• 19:06 Questioning AI use in defense and civilian sector.
• 25:25 Increased investment in security and product regulation.
• 27:21 Expect more AI news, less legislative involvement.
• 30:30 Observability key for zero trust framework implementation.
• 36:22 Prediction: Citizens will interface with AI technology.
• 37:16 Focus on user experience in government systems.
• 41:03 Election year brings unexpected black swan events.

2024 Predictions for the Public Sector

Revamping of the FedRAMP Program

Ross predicts that in 2024, FedRAMP will be completely reauthorized based on a pending OMB memo that is expected to be finalized in late 2023. This revamp is intended to streamline and improve the FedRAMP authorization process to facilitate faster adoption of cloud-based solutions in government.

However, Roger believes the changes could temporarily slow things down as agencies take time to understand the implications of the new FedRAMP structure on their systems and assess risks. This could require investments from industry as well to meet new requirements that emerge.

FedRAMP 2024: "I think it's going to have a lot of agencies take a hard look at their risk and decide where they want to elevate certain high-valued assets, high-valued systems, high-valued programs, and the authorizations themselves are gonna raise in their level." — Ross Nodurft

Shift From Moderate Baseline to Higher Baseline of Controls

As part of the FedRAMP reauthorization, Ross expects many agencies will shift their systems from a moderate baseline to a higher baseline of security controls. With more interconnected systems and datasets, agencies will want heightened protections in place.

Roger concurs that the increased scrutiny on risks coming out of the FedRAMP changes will lead organizations, especially those managing high-value assets, to pursue FedRAMP High authorizations more frequently.

Increased Demand for a FedRAMP High Environment

Given the predictions around agencies elevating their security thresholds, Willie asks Ross whether the pipeline of solutions currently pursuing FedRAMP High authorizations could face disruptions from new program requirements.

Ross believes there will be some temporary slowdowns as changes are absorbed. However, he notes that the goals of the reauthorization are to increase flexibility and accessibility of authorizations. So over time, the new structure aims to accelerate FedRAMP High adoption.

2024 Predictions: Navigating FedRAMP Changes While Maintaining Industry Momentum

As Ross highlighted, the intent of the FedRAMP reauthorization is to help industry get solutions to market faster. But in the short-term, there could be some complications as vendors have to realign to new standards and processes.

Willie notes that companies like Dynatrace have already begun working towards FedRAMP High in anticipation of rising customer demand. But sudden shifts in requirements could impact those efforts, so he hopes there will be considerations for solutions currently undergoing authorizations.

2024 Predictions on Cybersecurity Trends

Zero Trust Framework

Roger discusses how zero trust architectures are progressing forward in adoption, even though the concept has lost some of its previous buzz. The zero trust memo is still in place, people are budgeting for zero trust and funding is starting to be allocated towards implementation.

As Willie points out, every agency he works with is developing zero trust strategies and architectures. However, he notes these architectures can be extremely complex, especially when adding in cloud and containerized environments.

2024 Predictions: Observability Critical for Security in Complex Cloud Environments

Ross echoes Willie's point that there is an increasing movement towards cloud-based environments. This is driving changes to FedRAMP to accommodate the proliferation of SaaS applications.

With more enterprise environments leveraging SaaS apps, complexity is being introduced. Ross predicts that to protect, understand and maintain visibility across such complex environments with many different applications, overarching observability will become a necessity.

Impact of the Shift Towards Cloud-Based Environments and SaaS Applications

The shift towards cloud-based environments and SaaS applications ties back to the FedRAMP changes and predictions from Ross. As agencies move to the cloud and adopt more SaaS apps, they lose visibility and observability.

Willie predicts observability will become "connective tissue" across zero trust architectures to provide that much-needed visibility across various pillars like devices, networks and users.

The Rise of User Experience in Government Systems: "I think we're gonna see more and more, of a focus on user experience because I believe with all the things we're talking about, user experience could be impacted." — Willie Hicks

Importance of Observability for Visibility and Understanding

Roger concurs that visibility is crucial for security because "you can't secure what you can't see." He notes that observability and understanding where data is and what apps are doing will become a prerequisite for achieving zero trust.

The Importance of Data Visibility in Security: "Well, I think it's gonna become table stakes, if you will, when it comes to security, because you can't secure what you can't see." — Roger Cressey

Carolyn highlights how visibility has been embedded in zero trust frameworks from the beginning. However, Willie predicts its importance will be even more prominent in 2024.

AI and Technology Innovations

2024 Predictions: Navigating AI Promise and Pitfalls in the Public Sector

Roger highlighted the tremendous upside that AI-enabled customer experience solutions could provide for government agencies in improving efficiency and service delivery. However, he also noted that any negative experiences resulting from these solutions would be heavily scrutinized and amplified. This indicates there may be cautious adoption of AI in government during 2024 as agencies balance potential benefits and risks.

The Importance of Reciprocity in Government Technology: "I just hope they have the wherewithal and the focus to push the right people in the right parts of both the Department of Defense and to the federal civilian side to think about how reciprocity impacts their availability in the marketplace technology or commercial technology solutions out there." — Ross Nodurft

Willie predicted there would be carefully orchestrated success stories around AI implementations, supporting Roger's point. This suggests that while innovation will continue, government agencies will likely roll out AI solutions slowly and target opportunities where impact can be demonstrated.

Increased Investment in Security and Product Innovation

Roger predicted that defensive cyber capabilities enabled by AI will draw greater attention and interest in 2024. Willie noted that AI is also being used in more advanced cyber attacks. Together, these trends indicate there will be an increased focus on using AI responsibly to enhance security while also defending against malicious uses.

On the commercial side, Ross predicted venture capital investment into AI will accelerate in 2024, driving constant product updates across language models and other platforms. This rapid product innovation seems likely to widen the gap with public sector adoption.

2024 Predictions: Balancing AI Progress and Governance in the Public Sector

While the panelists disagreed on the likelihood of major AI regulations from Congress in 2024, Willie predicted that high-profile incidents involving AI could build pressure for new laws, even if passage takes time. He and Ross suggested implementation of AI guidance for government agencies is more likely in the near term.

The Future Impacts of AI: "I think that the developers of AI are gonna continue to set the agenda, and the deployers, in other words, all the sectors as well as industry sectors, the developers, the deployers are still gonna be playing catch up." — Roger Cressey

Roger noted that negative experiences with AI in government would also spur calls for regulation. However, he said acting prematurely without understanding the impacts could pose challenges. Together, these perspectives indicate oversight and governance guardrails for AI will increase but could slow adoption if not balanced thoughtfully.

2024 Predictions: AI Policy Progress and Global Technology Leadership

Potential Dysfunction in Congress Impacting Regulatory Progress

Roger points out the significant disagreement between the House and Senate that could prevent Congress from finding common ground on AI regulation in 2024. The divide relates to whether the focus should be on continuing innovation or implementing more safeguards and oversight. Meaningful AI legislation at a national level would require lengthy deliberation and consensus-building that likely won't occur in an election year.

Potential Motivation for U.S. Innovation by China’s Advancements in AI

According to Roger, China's rapid advances in AI development and utilization could light a fire under the U.S. administration and Congress to accelerate American innovation in this area. However, the U.S. policy community also wants to ensure AI progresses responsibly. Roger argues China's AI capabilities could be an impetus for shaping U.S. strategy in 2024, balancing both innovation and risk management.

The Global Race for AI Dominance: "Where China is moving rapidly and creatively on AI development, adoption and deployment will be a jet fuel for motivating the administration and congress to do more regarding how can innovation on the U.S. side regarding AI move quicker." — Roger Cressey

Industry Adaptation to Change

2024 Predictions: Navigating Changes to FedRAMP and Industry Adaptation

Ross discusses some of the challenges the industry may face in adapting to the changes outlined in the anticipated 2023 FedRAMP reauthorization memo. He notes that while the intent of the memo is to streamline and open up the authorization process to allow more applications into the pipeline faster, implementing these changes could initially cause some disruption.

Ross predicts there may be a "learning curve" as agencies and vendors figure out how the changes impact their specific systems and day-to-day operations. This could temporarily slow things down until the new processes are fully understood. However, Ross expects that after this initial bumpy period, the changes will ultimately enable faster movement of applications through the FedRAMP process.

The Government’s Aim to Create a Process for a Smoother Transition

Ross highlights that the government's aim in revising the FedRAMP authorization process is to make it easier for agencies to access and leverage innovative cloud-based technologies. The memo revisions seek to create multiple pathways for obtaining authorizations, rather than just one narrow pipeline that applications must move through.

Discussing the Future of AI: "We gotta talk about, whether it's AI governance, whether it's innovation in AI, it's AI risks, and really understanding how do we balance all 3 of those in a way while we're still moving forward." — Roger Cressey

The hope is that these process improvements will pave the way for more small and medium cloud-based software companies to get their products authorized for use in government. This will give agencies more options and flexibility in adopting modern solutions. However, Ross cautions that in the short-term there may be some disruptions as outlined above.

Predictions for Significant Impact in 2024

In terms of predictions for 2024, Ross expects that the FedRAMP changes, combined with broader cloud migration efforts underway in government, will lead more agencies to request higher baseline security authorizations. Where they may have been comfortable with a FedRAMP Moderate authorization previously, Ross predicts agencies will now ask vendors for FedRAMP High in more and more cases. This will likely impact software providers who will have to adapt their systems and applications to meet the more stringent security controls.

About Our Guests

Ross Nodurft

Ross Nodurft is the Executive Director of the Alliance for Digital Innovation (ADI), a coalition of technology companies focused on bringing commercial, cloud-based solutions to the public sector. ADI focuses on promoting policies that enable IT modernization, cybersecurity, smarter acquisition and workforce development. Prior to joining ADI, Ross spent several years working with industry partners on technology and cybersecurity policy and several years in government, both in the executive and legislative branches, including Chief of the Office of Management and Budgets cyber team in the White House.

Roger Cressey

Roger Cressey is a Partner with Mountain Wave Ventures. He previously served as a Senior Vice President at Booz Allen Hamilton, supporting the firm’s cyber security practice in the Middle East. Prior to joining Booz Allen, he was President and Founder of Good Harbor Consulting LLC, a security and risk management consulting firm.

Mr. Cressey’s government service included senior cyber security and counterterrorism positions in the Clinton and Bush Administrations. At the White House, he served as Chief of Staff of the President’s Critical Infrastructure Protection Board from November 2001 – September 2002. He also served as Deputy for Counterterrorism on the National Security Council staff from November 1999 to November 2001. He was responsible for the coordination and implementation of U.S. counterterrorism policy and managed the U.S. Government's response to multiple terrorism incidents, including the Millennium terror alert, the USS COLE attack, and the September 11th attacks.

Willie Hicks

Willie Hicks is the Public Sector Chief Technologist for Dynatrace. Willie has spent over a decade orchestrating solutions for some of the most complex network environments, from cloud to cloud native applications and microservices. He understands tracking and making sense of systems and data that has grown beyond human ability. Working across engineering and product management to ensure continued growth and speed innovation, he has implemented Artificial Intelligence and automation solutions over hundreds of environments to tame and secure their data.

Episode Links

• FedRAMP
• Alliance for Digital Innovation
• DoDIIS Worldwide