In this episode of the In Case You Missed It podcast, host Speaker A leads a round‑table with industry observers Joe and Jed to dissect three hot topics shaping government technology. First, they examine the rollout of mobile driver’s licenses as a stepping stone toward unified, decentralized digital identity, noting state pilots, blockchain interest, and Apple’s upcoming ID features. Second, they break down Mark43’s recent $100 million financing round, highlighting the company’s near‑decade history, its suite of public‑safety software, and the strategic push to expand into Canada, the UK, and other markets. Finally, they discuss the escalating cyber‑insurance market, citing a GAO report that showed premium hikes of 10‑30 % in Q4 2020, the scarcity of breach reporting, and the pressure on insurers to demand stronger cybersecurity practices, prompting a debate over the government’s role in stabilizing the ecosystem. Throughout, the hosts stress the rapid market momentum, the interplay of technology, policy, and risk, and the need for coordinated responses as GovTech continues to evolve.
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All right, TGIF! Welcome back for another episode of In Case You Missed It. We were out for a couple weeks, we had a great company holiday around July 4th, but we're back in action and the market hasn't slowed down any in our time away. It's been a wild couple weeks in the GovTech space, and so a lot of ground to kind of COVID today as we look at some of the latest happenings. You know, one thing that stood out to me was something actually that was a feature in our latest issue of Government Technology magazine, and we've talked about this before, but, you know, the mobile driver's license dynamic and really what that paves the way for when it comes to unified digital identity. We know identity is kind of the killer app, and it's been a topic of conversation in a lot of our forums that we've had, and actually just for many years. It's such a proprietary thing, so it's really interesting to see how states across the country are really starting to focus on leveraging identity in a decentralized way. They're looking at technologies like blockchain. And not just making it portable on your device where you can show your ID if you're pulled over, but leveraging remote technology and edge technology to authenticate a user on their phone to access and unlock government services, whether it's virtual services or services that are in person. And so this is one that really stood out to me as kind of an interesting takeaway. You can see what your states are doing. We're tracking a lot of, you know, the role that CIOs play in this and the legislation that's emerging around this. But Joe and Jed, I'm not sure what you're seeing on your side. We don't have this in my state yet, as you can see, Texas is still grayed out here, but it's an exciting time, especially with announcements like what Apple's doing with WWDC and trying to take ID and bring it to your phone. What do you guys make of this?
No, I'm anxious to get it in my state as well. No, I think it's an exciting market to follow, right? We've obviously seen the efforts around ID for a while with the Department of Transportation providing some federal funding going back a couple years to test some pilots that really gave birth to some of the states that are, that are on the map and others that will follow. I think the other part around this that's interesting to follow is what we've seen around vaccines and some of the other aspects that can go into the wallet. Companies like PayIt and what they're doing in this space, and NIC and many others. I think it's going to be a pretty active space over the next couple years.
And speaking of that activity, I know, Joe, one thing that we talked about right beforehand was the new round that Mark43 raised. So go ahead and break that down for us.
Yeah, I mean, obviously looking at the public safety vertical, they're a vertical that tends to be very leading edge in terms of their adoption for technology. When you look at this, it's very interesting in terms of its size. Mark43 is a company that, you know, has been around for just under 10 years, just raised $100 million. They've got a pretty compelling suite in the public safety space, records management, CAD, many other things. But what struck me about this announcement was obviously the size of the investment, but also that it's got an international flavor to it too. So Mark43's, both in terms of this raise, came from some international investors, but will also use these funds to expand internationally. They're going to obviously deepen their relationships and engagements here in the US, but look to expand into Canada and the UK and abroad. This isn't their only raise. I think to date, the, the GT article says they've raised nearly about $260 million. So very active, pretty interesting raise, and look forward to see kind of what attention the GovTech market continues to get, not only here in the US but abroad.
Yeah, it looks like they're on a trajectory towards our next GovTech IPO, so we'll be following them really closely to see how things progress for them. But exciting to see the momentum and energy in the justice and public safety bracket of the market. And Jed, you've got some, some interesting news around kind of the cyber insurance space. I know this one's been top of mind and we've talked about it as well, but tell us a little bit about this article.
So the complexity of the cybersecurity issue just becomes more and more fascinating to me. So, you know, obviously we've seen a ton of attacks recently on a lot of different organizations, and that of course has raised questions about, well, what can be done from a government perspective to help organizations basically avoid these attacks so it doesn't affect citizens? But then you get into this whole other ballgame where you're seeing so many attacks and so, so much ransomware, and so that creates A new dynamic with the cyber insurance market. And so what this article by Jewel, one of our writers, talks about is that what is government's role right now? Because here's a number in the article that really got my attention. So this is from a report from the Government Accountability Office. In Q4 2020, a number of cyber insurance companies were charging 10 to 30% more than they were the previous quarter. So that really does show you the amount of— well, just the sheer amount of attacks that everyone's experiencing, but also that insurers are trying to figure out what is the risk involved, how can we make a profit in this industry. And so there's a lot of questions about that. You know, one of the hurdles they're having to try to jump right now is just the lack of information. And what's one of the things, uh, that causes that lack of information? The fact that not all organizations report attacks. And so that really limits the information that insurers have to determine what the risk actually is. And then the other thing too is that now cyber insurance companies are saying, hey, if you want our plans, you have to follow certain cybersecurity best practices. So they're doing everything they can to try to figure out how can they profit from this while also helping people out. And so that's really the question is, what does government need to do? Does government need to intervene more here to get a handle on this situation? Because this affects government. Obviously, government works with a lot of vendors, and if something happens to a vendor and there's some sensitive information involved, I mean, that can be a heck of a domino roll.
You know, I think we heard some chatter at our Digital Communities and Digital State Summits earlier this year around some of the difficulties that government organizations were having in terms of cyber insurance. And I think, Jed, you're right. I think as these attacks continue to proliferate and target government, cyber insurance rates are very likely to increase. And I think that means that those jurisdictions that are— and companies that are out there trying to get cyber insurance are going to be finding it much more difficult and expensive to obtain.
Yeah, and I think this has come up in a lot of our conversations as well, where, you know, cyber insurance You know, has always been kind of a checkbox, like, hey, this is a risk mitigation tactic, but it's no longer enough. I mean, you look at the average cost of a breach, I know that we've talked about, and just like PII and, you know, monitoring and everything else that goes along with it. And so agencies can't sink all their risk mitigation strategies just into a set of appliances or an insurance policy. You really have to start to think broader than that. And so this is a growing issue. I mean, we've seen ransomware attacks just continue to exponentially increase at the public sector from little cities to, you know, the most complex infrastructure providers that are out there. So a growing challenge that's going to require a collective response.
Yeah. Well, again, thanks for joining us this week on In Case You Missed It. It was an exciting week in GovTech. We expect the market to be just as active next week, so we'll see you next Friday. You can join us here, check out the videos online. We'll put all notes in the show notes to the articles, and we want to wish you a wonderful weekend. Take care.
