What is AI in the public sector?

Government agencies worldwide are witnessing a rise in the adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to solve critical challenges in public service delivery, simplifying complex, time-intensive, and costly processes. The development and application of AI as a tool to support the services required to meet the public’s needs—from data management and analytics to operational support—play a significant role in driving public sector transformation and modernization. 

As agencies discover new ways to utilize AI across departments, two primary AI applications are emerging in public sector agencies: predictive AI, which uses historical data to forecast future events and trends to mitigate risk, and generative AI, which creates, translates, or modifies content by learning from extensive datasets. As a result, artificial intelligence will streamline and improve the accuracy of customer claims processes, aid in fraud detection and prevention, reduce manual workloads, and provide better data forecasting.

Discover how to integrate Red Hat AI into your organization 

Advancements in AI can drastically improve citizen experiences, transforming how citizens interact with government services and providing a more seamless experience. Policy makers and other public administrators can deliver more effective services and better allocate government resources to their constituents.

Agencies looking to AI to help them scale public service delivery gain several benefits with its implementation, including culling data from multiple sources to better manage existing claims, and acquiring and distributing the most up-to-date information to aid in the prediction, identification, and prevention of fraud. 

An improved data distribution process allows administrators to prioritize and verify claims efficiently, thereby streamlining the overall claims process. This helps to improve the accuracy and speed of information communicated to claimants, policymakers, and politicians. The collation of data into public sector algorithms can also help government agencies predict the needs of their citizens and give public sector administrators an increased ability to manage and improve service availability.

Main advantages of AI 

Here are some key benefits of AI use in the public sector for citizens, administrators, and policymakers.

Better service experience 

Data insights processed by AI algorithms and real-time predictive analytics can enhance overall service delivery and user experience; citizens can get the answers they need when they need them from the right service, leading to better outcomes and a reduction in wasted resources. For example, Eusko Jaurlaritzaren Informatika Elkartea (EJIE), Spain’s IT department located in its Basque region, used Red Hat® technologies to provide AI-supported digital services to its citizens. The Basque government wanted to support its citizens by providing services in their chosen language. Using AI, the IT team developed language tools within the framework of the Itzuli project to enable the translation and synthesis of text-to-speech from Basque into Spanish, French, and English and the transcription of speech-to-text in Basque and Spanish.

Improved claims processing

Handling benefit claims and payments can consume thousands of agency work hours; manual processing can increase the risk of human error, negatively impacting both citizens and agency efficiency. Introducing AI into workflows can automate claim filing and provide data-driven recommendations, expediting the claims process and enhancing employee and citizen experiences.

Mitigation of fraud, waste, and abuse

Robotic process automation (RPA) rapidly analyzes documents with speed and accuracy compared to manual methods. The AI tool can effectively flag fraudulent activity and waste, leading to more efficient use of government resources and funds. With continuous algorithm improvement, the system becomes more adept at detecting fraud, providing scalable protection for citizens and agencies alike. 

Broadening access to public sector offerings

The use of AI-assisted guidance can expand the availability and access of services to citizens. Employing AI to validate and process claims enables more administrators to manage benefit claims, reducing the overreliance of agencies on a small handful of specialists and facilitating faster claims processing.

Expediting policy development

Policy development involves many stakeholders and a complex consideration of factors that can impact citizens. Computational AI tools can accelerate the process by potentially replacing trial-and-error methods with more efficient models to support policy creation and review, reducing legal and technical challenges and overall costs.

Build a production-ready AI/ML environment

Despite the advantages of AI in the public sector, its implementation presents a set of challenges for public sector agencies.

Managing data collection and analysis

Government-powered AI solutions rely on large, real-time datasets for effective training while also needing to protect personally identifiable information (PII). 

Public sector workflows typically rely on manual processes and maintain rigid structures and hierarchies.. This highlights a challenge for many departments integrating new data acquisition procedures and technologies into existing workflows. Additionally, citizen data is siloed and fragmented across multiple networks; in some instances, the data is still in paper form, making it difficult to centralize it into a single database.

Addressing stakeholder needs

Creating alignment among multiple stakeholders is critical for successful AI/ML implementation and adoption. This includes citizens, data scientists, IT departments, operation teams, public sector administrators, policymakers, and vendors, including independent software vendors (ISVs). Building consensus among all stakeholders reduces friction and empowers organizational decision-making around AI/ML enablement and use cases. Many private sector and telco organizations have established AI Centers of Excellence to optimize AI workstreams.

Addressing privacy concerns

Data is a vital asset for many organizations. To effectively train government AI tools using large datasets, especially those containing PII, agencies must adhere to GDPR compliance regulations and the EU AI Act, which reinforces citizen privacy rights under GDPR. Access to data is only granted on a legal basis or a claim. 

Handling regional policy challenges

Traditionally, Europe has taken a more precautionary approach to AI use in comparison to the United States and China, with a more stringent regulatory environment. EU laws typically consist of a collective of layered policies like GDPR, the AI Act, the Data Act, DSA, and DMA. Each of the 27 EU member states also has its own policies, presenting compliance expectation challenges to non-EU countries doing business across borders. 

Maximizing optimization and efficiency

High-performing cloud computing environments can provide the flexibility agencies need to meet the unique challenges they face; however, they require a robust IT and public sector infrastructure. Government agencies will need cost-effective solutions that optimize network edge operations and analyze data at the edge point device.

Transmitting from network collection points requires significant bandwidth. Public sector data collection is also driving rapid storage expansion, particularly for systems such as geospatial imaging (GIS) and cross-border systems.

Read more about IT automation in government

Red Hat’s open source enterprise IT software is developed in collaboration with corporations and government agencies–including with experts and specialists in the public sector. 

With Red Hat’s open and modular AI/ML solution, customers can operationalize AI/ML projects quickly for greater personalization, stakeholder control, and transparency, allowing agencies to:

• Protect current IT investments while adding value. Red Hat accelerates and simplifies AI/ML project deployment and lifecycle management through partnerships and integrations.
• Access industry-leading open source technologies within a hybrid cloud solution providing essential AI functionalities like business rules, process automation, constraint solving, business optimization, and machine learning.
• Uses powerful data connectivity capabilities through Red Hat’s customizable intelligent Data-as-a-Service to meet the evolving demands of internal and external mandates.
• Scale platform capabilities with flexible components, ensuring replicability of processes and security for rapid innovation.
• Enable prescriptive yet flexible continuous integration/continuous delivery (CI/CD) architecture to streamline machine learning operations (MLOps), the transition from machine learning modeling and training to deployment and ongoing improvement.

The future of AI use in the public sector looks promising. Utilizing solutions like Red Hat OpenShift® AI and Red Hat Enterprise Linux® AI can help agencies streamline and automate manual, labor-intensive processes, allowing them to focus on providing the best services to their constituents.