News: Security will displace cost and agility as the primary reason for government agencies to switch to the public cloud.

Increased security will be the primary driver for the extensive adoption of public cloud options for digital government platforms.

Market research firm Gartner said that government agencies will use the public cloud to meet increasing expectations for performance and value.

The company predicts that by 2018, security will be the number one driver for government agencies to move to the public cloud. Cost savings and agility will drop to number two and three places.

Gartner research director Neville Cannon said: "Many cloud service providers, such as Amazon Web Services, Microsoft and Google, invest heavily in incorporating higher levels of security into their products to continue building confidence that their data is more secure.

"Many of these providers can invest more than what most nations could afford, let alone the average government agency."

Cannon however noted that nationalism, together with worries on data sovereignty, will slow things down.

Gartner has also predicted that by 2018, more than half of Tier 1 support services at government contact centres will be virtualised.

The move will enable the government to re-assign the workforce to more value-added activities like case management and programme evaluation.

The report also revealed how more than 25% of government agencies are predicted to adopt ‘BYO algo policies’ by 2018 to strengthen workforce-led innovation.

Government agencies will be forced to actively seek the talent of workers who plan to bring their proprietary intellectual property to work due to the increasing availability of self-service data discovery and business intelligence/analytic tools, as well as the creation of a consumerised digital work environment, the research firm said.

Gartner research director Rick Howard said: "The formulation and adoption of BYO algo policies in government will help address the competitive disadvantage that public-sector employers often face in the quest to recruit top talent.

"By doing so, agencies will fully benefit from the talent of employees whose personal success rests on using all the digital tools at their disposal."

Last year, Verizon said in a report that public cloud services are likely to be used only for very specific workloads and applications in the future, as the use of it is declining.

As the prices between public and private cloud services narrow, the report revealed that the private cloud will cease to be a luxury product only available to larger enterprises in 2016.

This is due to the fact that the technology has advanced, with starting costs and other barriers to entry for private cloud lowered, making it more widely accessible to those without larger budgets.

Verizon found that 27% of businesses are already using the private cloud and 17% have plans to implement it.