Category: Public Sector

As the world grapples with COVID-19, researchers and scientists are united in an effort to understand the disease and find ways to detect and treat infections as quickly as possible. Today, Amazon Web Services (AWS) launched CORD-19 Search, a new search website powered by machine learning that can help researchers quickly and easily search tens of thousands of research papers and documents using natural language questions.

In March 2020, the AWS Public Sector Blog covered stories on tools that support remote learning and teaching, cloud cost optimization, and achieving five nines in justice and public safety. Check out the top five blog posts of the month.

Data related to healthcare, in both volume and variety, is undergoing a tremendous expansion. One of the best ways to tackle complicated data integration is through a data lake: a centralized, curated, and secured repository that stores all your data, both in its original form and prepared for analysis. A data lake enables you to break down data silos and combine different types of analytics, such as data warehousing, big data processing, or operational analytics, to gain insights and guide better business decisions.

Using AWS and open-source software, Fred Hutch built a single, user-friendly, browser-based solution, Motuz, to streamline and simplify upload of large quantities of data. Motuz helped Fred Hutch de-silo its data and make it shareable and accessible.

Data is an organization’s critical asset, which is why safeguarding it against ransomware attacks, natural disasters, emergencies, or technical failures is a top priority. Legacy data storage, such as tape, makes sharing and protecting data costly and time consuming. AWS released a series of educational webinars and whiteboarding videos that discuss how to raise the bar on data protection in the AWS Cloud.

Education ministries, colleges, and schools around the world are rapidly adopting remote learning and working to maintain business continuity and provide students with continued access to education. From quickly scaling learning management systems and launching virtual classrooms to upskilling educators and setting up remote help-desks, AWS and its education technology partners are providing mission-critical infrastructure that is enabling our customers to continue delivering against their missions, safely and efficiently. From Italy to Bahrain to the United States, check out these stories.

Organizations around the world are making headlines after falling victim to ransomware attacks. Ransomware is malicious code designed to gain unauthorized access to systems and data and encrypt that data to block access by legitimate users. A newly released eBook, “Securing your AWS environments from ransomware,” shares who is at risk and why ransomware is effective, whether to pay or not pay the ransom, and how customers can automatically inherit certain security controls by building on AWS.

From school districts to researchers to governments, our customers are maintaining business and educational continuity while being focused on protecting their citizens, students, and patients. How can we provide equal access to high-quality learning opportunities to all? How can we remove barriers set by distance and circumstance? How can we make services more accessible for everyone regardless of language, location, or differing learning needs? We believe the cloud can help.

Over the past few weeks, I have been inspired by the vast community of EdTech companies who have stepped up to transform learning for millions of students around the world. During this unprecedented time of temporary and sustained school closings, virtual classrooms have become a necessity to ensure that teachers and students stay connected, and students continue their education. Whether schools need tools to keep administration offices, educators, and students connected, or need to deploy learning management systems, our EdTech Partners have a number of solutions.

State government labor and workforce development agencies are wrestling with an unprecedented surge in demand for services. In one week, 6.6 million Americans filed for initial unemployment insurance (UI) claims, nearly double the previous week. Many states are straining to meet this increase for demand in services. The cloud can help labor and agencies quickly scale and shift to meet constituent needs.