https://statetechmagazine.com/ en https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/05/nascio-2026-midyear-state-chief-privacy-officers-gain-influence-ai-expands-role State chief privacy officers are often tasked with protecting vast amounts of sensitive citizen data — and in Idaho, that official works alone. “I am a team of one, and I have no funding,” said Taylor Bothke, Idaho’s CPO and accessibility manager, describing the reality of building a statewide privacy program largely from scratch. “You can make magic with very little.” That tension — expanding responsibility paired with limited resources — is at the heart of a new report from the National Association of State Chief Information Officers, which finds that privacy leaders across state government… Thu, 07 May 2026 15:19:10 -0400 Mickey McCarter https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/05/nascio-2026-midyear-state-chief-privacy-officers-gain-influence-ai-expands-role https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/05/nascio-2026-midyear-states-shift-ai-assists-ai-acts-tennessee-cto-says State governments are beginning to move beyond generative artificial intelligence tools that assist employees and toward more advanced systems that can take action. But the transition will depend less on technology than on people, said Tennessee CTO Jerry Jones. Speaking at the midyear conference of the National Association of State Chief Information Officers recently, Jones described his state’s approach to AI as a deliberate, two-year journey focused on governance, workforce readiness and carefully scoped pilot projects. “We can focus on agentic AI and tell you how we’re not there yet,”… Wed, 06 May 2026 18:04:04 -0400 Mickey McCarter https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/05/nascio-2026-midyear-states-shift-ai-assists-ai-acts-tennessee-cto-says https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/05/nascio-2026-midyearcitizen-digital-identity-fragmentation-funding-hurdles State technology leaders are accelerating efforts to modernize how residents prove who they are online, but fragmented systems, funding constraints and governance challenges continue to slow progress, according to new survey data shared at the National Association of State Chief Information Officers Midyear Conference. For Arizona CIO J.R. Sloan, the stakes are clear: Without a cohesive approach to digital identity, states will struggle to deliver the seamless, secure online services residents increasingly expect. “We all have a problem that we need to address,” said Sloan, who is currently… Tue, 05 May 2026 13:54:33 -0400 Mickey McCarter https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/05/nascio-2026-midyearcitizen-digital-identity-fragmentation-funding-hurdles https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/05/nascio-2026-midyear-state-cisos-report-falling-confidence-ai-threats-accelerate State government CISOs are growing significantly less confident in their ability to protect government systems as cyberthreats intensify and budgets tighten, according to the 2026 NASCIO-Deloitte Cybersecurity Study released recently. Just 26% of state CISOs said they are “extremely” or “very” confident their state’s information assets are secure, down sharply from 48% in 2022, the biennial survey found. The findings, unveiled at the National Association of State Chief Information Officers Midyear Conference, reflect a rapidly evolving threat landscape shaped by artificial intelligence,… Mon, 04 May 2026 20:27:05 -0400 Mickey McCarter https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/05/nascio-2026-midyear-state-cisos-report-falling-confidence-ai-threats-accelerate https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/04/app-modernization-gateway-ai-ready-government State governments are standing at a pivotal moment in their digital transformation journeys. Expectations from constituents have never been higher: Services should be personalized, available around the clock and as intuitive as the consumer apps people use every day. At the same time, agencies are being asked to explore artificial intelligence to improve efficiency, automate routine tasks and deliver better outcomes. But many of these ambitions collide with a hard reality: core applications that were never built for this era. For years, technical debt was often viewed as a back-office concern… Thu, 30 Apr 2026 14:59:28 -0400 Mickey McCarter https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/04/app-modernization-gateway-ai-ready-government https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/04/chatbots-open-door-state-government-access Twenty years ago, a resident moving to Mississippi might be impressed by the ability to search the state’s website and quickly find information about income taxes and voter registration. But today, says state CIO Craig Orgeron, that same experience feels “disjointed.” “Searches are becoming prompts,” Orgeron says. “Bringing all of the information together and putting it into context creates a better experience.” Mississippi was ahead of the artificial intelligence curve, rolling out the chatbot MISSI in 2017, and as AI has evolved, so has the tool. Today, the database supporting MISSI runs on… Tue, 28 Apr 2026 00:11:25 -0400 Calvin Hennick https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/04/chatbots-open-door-state-government-access https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/04/qa-pennsylvanias-ciso-risk-reduction-zero-trust-and-next-cybersecurity-frontier Andy Ritter brings more than three decades of IT experience to his role as CISO for the commonwealth of Pennsylvania. A career technologist who began working with personal computers in the early 1990s, Ritter has spent the past decade focused on cybersecurity and risk management. He joined Pennsylvania state government in 2017 as a contractor before becoming a full-time employee the following year, initially serving as a risk manager. Ritter was named deputy CISO in 2023, and he became CISO in February. Known for his hands-on approach, Ritter views cybersecurity through a pragmatic lens,… Mon, 27 Apr 2026 14:37:36 -0400 Mickey McCarter https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/04/qa-pennsylvanias-ciso-risk-reduction-zero-trust-and-next-cybersecurity-frontier https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/04/states-deploy-desktop-service-standardize-endpoints-and-boost-security Managing thousands of devices across multiple agencies is no small task. In Kansas, State Chief IT Officer Jeff Maxon is working toward a unified solution. “We’re starting to standardize on methods of deployment and device management,” he says. Maxon is rolling out the Tanium Endpoint Management solution to various agencies, to enable them to centralize the provisioning and support of Dell devices. This Desktop as a Service solution enables IT leaders to simplify management and strengthen security while enabling workforce flexibility. “DaaS makes it possible to apply consistent policies and… Thu, 23 Apr 2026 17:06:42 -0400 Adam Stone https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/04/states-deploy-desktop-service-standardize-endpoints-and-boost-security https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/04/how-evaluate-whether-hci-right-your-state-or-local-government-organization I’ve had a version of the same conversation with state and local government IT leaders dozens of times. They’re trying to modernize data centers, cut costs and make sense of an infrastructure landscape that grows more complex by the day. Someone mentions hyperconverged infrastructure, and the question is almost always the same: “Is HCI right for us?” My honest answer: it depends. And the decision criteria matter more than the technology itself. To evaluate it properly, we must first strip away the jargon. At its simplest, hyperconverged infrastructure is a software-defined architecture that… Wed, 22 Apr 2026 14:43:31 -0400 Scott Ragsdale https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/04/how-evaluate-whether-hci-right-your-state-or-local-government-organization https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/04/case-cyber-insurance-state-government State governments manage enormous volumes of sensitive information every day, from tax records and health data to the systems that keep essential public services running. When this information is exposed or disrupted, the costly consequences for states and residents make cybersecurity a top government priority. Beyond standard cybersecurity safeguards, cyber liability insurance adds a critical layer of protection that enables governments to respond quickly to incidents, safeguard public resources and maintain operations during disruptive events. Whether purchasing coverage, developing… Tue, 21 Apr 2026 16:50:55 -0400 Chadwick Stephens https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2026/04/case-cyber-insurance-state-government