{"id":187015,"date":"2026-02-13T06:04:00","date_gmt":"2026-02-13T11:04:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/02\/13\/alabama-forms-emerging-tech-board-codifies-it-offices-cyber-responsibilities\/"},"modified":"2026-02-13T06:35:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-13T11:35:09","slug":"alabama-forms-emerging-tech-board-codifies-it-offices-cyber-responsibilities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/02\/13\/alabama-forms-emerging-tech-board-codifies-it-offices-cyber-responsibilities\/","title":{"rendered":"Alabama forms emerging tech board, codifies IT office’s cyber responsibilities"},"content":{"rendered":"

Alabama forms emerging tech board, codifies IT office’s cyber responsibilities<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/statescoop.com\/alabama-technology-quality-assurance-board\/<\/a><\/p>\n

Publish Date: 2026-02-13 06:04:00<\/a><\/p>\n

Source Domain: statescoop.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Author: <\/a><\/p>\n

Using an unordered list, summarize the following article with between 4 and 8 key points. <\/p>\n

Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey on Thursday announced a new statewide board tasked with ensuring that emerging technologies are deployed securely and \u201cresponsibly.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Technology Quality Assurance Board, which will include representatives from seven agencies \u2014 Education, Finance, Law Enforcement, Medicaid, Technology, Transportation and Revenue \u2014 is tasked with developing statewide standards and ensuring \u201cinnovation is implemented in a way that protects citizen data and enhances government services,\u201d according to a news release. Ivey called the board \u201ca critical step forward\u201d for advancing new technologies, and that it will do so while minding \u201coperational excellence.\u201d<\/p>\n

The lawmaker who drafted group\u2019s enabling legislation once described it as a \u201cclearinghouse for technology\u201d that will allow departments to \u201cstay on the same page.\u201d Such groups have become increasingly common as states have in recent years grappled with the intricacies of layering new artificial intelligence tools into their organizations.<\/p>\n

The board\u2019s creation was directed by legislation Ivey signed into law last May that also codified changes to the state\u2019s technology operations. It officially placed cybersecurity responsibilities under watch of the Office of Information Technology and its chief information officer, a role Daniel Urquhart has held since Ivey appointed him in 2023. The bill\u2019s sponsor, Rep. Mike Shaw, a Republican, explained to his fellow lawmakers during a hearing last March that the IT office, which had been given additional responsibilities in 2017, was already administering cybersecurity, but that his bill \u201cputs it in law.\u201d<\/p>\n

His bill also removed from statute some technology responsibilities that had been held by defunct bodies, like the state Department of Finance\u2019s data management division. It consolidated various laws defining the technology office\u2019s responsibilities, such as its role as a central administrator of technology services and \u201cthe centralized approving authority\u201d for acquiring all new technology and billing agencies for services.<\/p>\n

Shaw\u2019s bill breezed through the state legislature last year with few questions. Last April, one lawmaker asked: \u201cDoes this have anything to do with our crypto monies?\u201d Shaw replied that it did not. During another hearing, last February, Rep. Chris Sells, a Republican, replied to Shaw\u2019s description of the bill by saying: \u201cIs there anybody here who can understand what he\u2019s talking about?\u201d The bill was advanced by voice vote without further discussion.<\/p>\n

Shaw introduced his bill in one session by announcing that it would cause the other lawmakers to \u201ccatch government technology fever.\u201d<\/p>\n

The legislation, which is now part of Alabama state code, also provides that funding, direct appropriations and \u201cother funds\u201d related to IT services are to be held in a Telecommunications Revolving Fund, from which the CIO is permitted to make deposits and expenditures \u201cfrom time to time.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\tWritten by Colin Wood
\n\t\t\tColin Wood is the editor in chief of StateScoop and EdScoop. He’s reported on government information technology policy for more than a decade, on topics including cybersecurity, IT governance and artificial intelligence.<\/p>\n

colin.wood@statescoop.com<\/p>\n

Signal: cwood.64\t\t<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Alabama forms emerging tech board, codifies IT office’s cyber responsibilities https:\/\/statescoop.com\/alabama-technology-quality-assurance-board\/ Publish Date: 2026-02-13 06:04:00…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":187016,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/statescoop.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/02\/GettyImages-2234610842.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[20,24],"class_list":["post-187015","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cybersecurity","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-cybersecurity"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187015"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=187015"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187015\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":187017,"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187015\/revisions\/187017"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/187016"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=187015"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=187015"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/testing.news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=187015"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}