ATT_Sled Digital Transformation Depends on Secure, Reliable Connectivity

State, local and education (SLED) leaders are increasingly turning to digital services to improve access and equity in their communities — an evolution accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic. This digital transformation makes reliable, fast connectivity more important than ever. In a 2023 survey by the National Association of State Chief Information Officers, state CIO respondents listed both “digital government/digital services” and “broadband/wireless connectivity” among their top 10 strategic priorities. “[After the pandemic] people started questioning, ‘Do I have to be in person to do this task? Do I have to be in person for my education needs, or can I do it successfully and seamlessly over a virtual platform?’” said Joe Drygas, vice president of state and local government, education and health care for AT&T Business. “Whether you look at governments big or small, whether you look at education — higher ed down to kindergarten — bandwidth consumption is exploding.” As more advanced applications and emerging technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) are integrated into digital services, the connectivity they depend on must advance in tandem.

University campuses are excellent proving grounds for new technologies. They operate like small cities, but campus leadership, faculty and students are often tech-savvy and eager to experiment. At Purdue University, the Purdue Research Foundation (PRF) launched the Indiana 5G Zone for testing 5G-enabled technologies, work that requires a secure, low-latency, fast-processing network architecture. PRF tapped into AT&T’s Multi-Access Edge Computing (MEC) to power its essential research and improve productivity.

Use case: AT&T MEC accelerates research at Purdue University

SLED digital transformation depends on secure, reliable connectivity

State, local and education leaders are at the forefront of a digital services revolution. To accomplish this, the smart cities and campuses of the future require a solid network foundation.

Connectivity needs are growing

The benefits of digital services largely boil down to SLED leaders searching out ways to make it easier for their constituents to take advantage of available resources. This includes both those for whom digital access is a convenience and those for whom it is the only form of access. Notably, reliable services depend on connectivity improvements for both the provider and end-user. “There is a lot of focus on digitizing applications. Why would you wait in line, take a number and sit for a while if you don’t have to? So, we’re connecting agencies with reliable, secure connectivity to be able to provide those services,” Drygas said. “But there’s also the flip side which is getting internet access to the communities we serve.” Constituents expect to be able to access services anytime, anywhere, which drastically impacts networks. Traffic demands can be up to 1000 times greater in urban areas than rural, and uplink coverage is nearly as important as downlink coverage when considering new technologies. On a university campus, for example, students previously connected their laptops to the internet in select areas — classrooms, dorm rooms and the library. As the Internet of Things grows, students are taking those laptops, as well as phones, smart watches, and more, to every corner of the campus, expecting to use their devices for schoolwork or leisure activities at any time of day or night.

As a result, bandwidth consumption that used to be more cyclical is now constant — and the need is growing with each new IoT device. “Even in K-12, every student is connected, standardized testing has become connected. When a school loses internet, it’s hard for them to operate,” Drygas said. “The whole day is planned, but if I lose my internet connectivity, we have to do something else. It can quickly become disruptive.” While end-user needs for high-bandwidth, low-latency access grow, so do the needs of employees. A growing portion of the SLED workforce is working remotely, at least part-time, which also changes network requirements. “In response we’re flexing network capabilities to start delivering a similar experience at home that you expect when you show up to a corporate environment,” Drygas said. Nothing is one-size-fits-all, he added. SLED leaders need to keep in mind personal preferences for both constituents and staff, and even generational divides in how people choose to access resources. Some prefer digital access, while others prefer to access services in-person. The SLED community must be prepared to support both and everything in between. “For us at AT&T, it’s all about providing solutions for all of those preferences,” Drygas said, “from centralized to decentralized and the gamut of high speeds and security throughout.” Looking toward the future, industry support will become even more critical with the emergence of smart cities — the integration of advanced technologies to improve basic services and experiences throughout a municipality. Sensors and cameras, for example, can be used to collect data and information about public safety, transportation, infrastructure and more, but they also require enhanced cybersecurity measures to protect critical infrastructure. To further the development of smart cities of the future, AT&T worked with the Dallas Innovation Alliance (DIA) to create the DIA Smart Cities Living Lab, a section of downtown Dallas featuring smart city projects like environmental and pedestrian sensors, smart water metering, smart parking and public Wi-Fi, all powered by AT&T. “The smart city concept is already here and now, and I believe you're going to see that continue to evolve,” Drygas said. “To do that, you need cameras, sensors, smart, sophisticated software and AI, but you also absolutely need reliable, secure connectivity. No one is going to pull a thumb drive off of a camera and bring it back to a computer. It all has to be over the wire, real time, high capacity, low latency, and it has to be really secure.”

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Securing SLED connections

Expanding digital services "requires a whole new set of connectivity capabilities and security capabilities, especially when you're dealing with private information. You don't want bad actors to get a hold of it," Drygas said. While many organizations, including those within government and education, try to minimize internet access points to enhance security, IoT and software-defined applications make that strategy increasingly inefficient. A recent survey conducted by AT&T found that 76% of state and local government respondents reported investments of 11% or more directly allocated to cybersecurity. Equally important to purchasing secure solutions is ensuring a thorough security architecture. “It’s not the optimal way to route traffic. And now we see with a lot of cloud-based and cloud-first platforms that being able to get to these public clouds as fast and securely as possible provides the best performance and throughput,” Drygas said. “Otherwise, you introduce a lot of latency to that experience. Whether it’s your constituent or your workforce trying to access information, you want to have the most optimal route, which is often the internet.” Rather than limiting connections, SLED organizations must seek out other ways to secure expanding attack surfaces by securing each connection. Luckily, there are also a growing number of software-defined solutions for cybersecurity, which are faster and easier to deploy and manage than traditional premise-based firewalls. The key is to build in security by design, rather than tack it on as an afterthought. With more than 1,000 security-related patents, AT&T has been a leader in security technology for more than a century – safeguarding systems from basic voice communications to 5G. “Rather than just providing an internet connection, we are also helping secure it,” Drygas said. “We see 713.6 petabytes of data over our network on an average business day, we see bad actors from all points around the globe, often we can see events and threats early. So now we secure and discard that traffic, scrub it, alert and build that kind of security directly into the network. That’s how we’re thinking about secure connectivity.”

As states, localities and universities explore revolutionary technologies, access remains a significant challenge. It’s impossible to achieve equitable digital transformation when many people and communities have limited to no connectivity. “We’re really focused on trying to close the digital divide,” Drygas said. “Every American should have the right to internet access, and in a lot of ways, it levels the playing field.” In 2021, AT&T committed $2 billion to addressing the digital divide. That investment has manifested in programs like Connected Learning to enhance access and digital literacy and participation in the FCC’s Affordable Connectivity Program, which provides a monthly internet services discount to eligible households. Significant fiber and mobile network expansions are also bringing internet accessibility to more remote locations across the country. And while FirstNet® is the only wireless communications network built with and for public safety — it has had the added benefit of expanding overall coverage throughout the U.S. Built in a public-private partnership with the First Responder Network Authority, FirstNet provides public safety with over 2.97 million square miles of coverage — and the interoperability and advanced capabilities they need. Already, more than 28,000+ agencies and organizations, accounting for over 6 million connections, are on FirstNet.

Closing the digital divide

“It’s enabled us to push our networks further into rural communities and reach places previously unconnected,” Drygas said. 5G is also pushing the limits of what’s possible for cities and campuses, making them more digitized, but it’s not a panacea. Advanced connectivity between communities, public safety and government will require a combination of Wi-Fi, 5G and NextG, private cellular, edge computing and anything else that may develop in the future, according to Drygas. Each has different applications but all work together to optimize operations. “Ultimately, we’re excited for a day when most homes across the country will have access to high-bandwidth connectivity from their homes,” Drygas said. “There is a lot of work to be done, but this is all a big step in that direction of being able to get Americans connected.”

In 2023, AT&T worked with the Dallas Fort Worth International Airport (DFW) to build a next-level network to support all airport needs, from airlines and their employees to flyers and commercial operations. “Just about everybody in the airport needs to be online,” Drygas said. “So, we built and manage an advanced wireless network that leverages all the types of wireless connectivity that you would want to have in that situation — from 5G to millimeter wave to multi-edge computing to private cellular to Wi-Fi and fiber — and then security overtop of it. That, to me, is a showcase of what you're going to need at airports across the country.”

Use case: A next-level network for Dallas Fort Worth International Airport

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SLED organizations looking to build their own next-level networks will all have certain goals in common: maximized capacity, scalability, reliability and security. But when it comes to the details, a next-level network for a government agency will be different from a next-level network in an airport or K-12 education or higher education. Industry partnerships are crucial to identifying what a robust, secure next-level network looks like for each organization, as well as determining the right balance of solutions. “When we think about connectivity, we’re thinking of both fiber and mobile — converged connectivity. How can you take advantage of both together to give you not only the bandwidth and throughput, but also the reliability?” Drygas said. “Things happen, poles come down, fiber gets cut, storms do damage. The benefit of having both is continuity.” Drygas also encouraged SLED leaders to stay open-minded about trying new things. From state and local governments providing essential services to K-12 and higher education faculty shaping future leaders, the SLED mission is too important to become complacent about advancing technology. Drygas and his team are eager to share and apply industry learnings to public missions. “Every day, my team’s job is to wake up and serve those that serve the community,” Drygas said. “It’s about making our communities more secure and better connected. Supporting public safety, hospitals and health care, saving lives. It’s a big mission, and every customer we serve is essential to communities thriving in America.”

Shaping SLED’s connectivity future

Learn more about how AT&T can help state, local and education leaders establish a strong connectivity foundation to support expanding digital services.

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