Open data is a force for good but not without risks

abernard102@gmail.com 2012-07-11

Summary:

“The government's open data initiative, outlined in its white paper on 27 June, is a move towards making government data publicly available, to encourage its reuse. A wide range of data, of all types, is being released, from the financial transactions of government departments through to information on how bumblebees respond to different flowers, and is available at data.gov.uk. There are many potential gains from this initiative. Open data enables accountability: it is difficult to conceal something if the facts are there for all to see. Open data empowers communities: the truth about crime rates, educational achievement, social services and so on is laid bare. Open data even drives economic growth: more small companies are springing up that extract useful information from data. Open data may even lead to more accurate conclusions and better decisions, as a wider variety of interested parties have the opportunity to examine the facts. Open data also alleviates the force of Goodhart's law, which says that if attention is focused on a particular outcome then that outcome becomes useless as a measure of performance, as people ‘game’ to optimise it ... However, the open data initiative also raises some concerns. The potential threat to privacy is probably the foremost risk. Reducing this is tough, as has been recognised by the government. In 2011, Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude said: ‘It is my intention that no personal data will be shared with any third party as part of this initiative.’ It is questionable whether this can be achieved, partly due to the jigsaw effect – the use of multiple sources of data, which can be combined to yield information about individuals... Crime maps illustrate the sort of problems that can arise. The creation of online crime maps have been a clear public benefit, showing the police where resources should be concentrated and helping them to improve their tactics, while the public can identify risky areas to avoid and demand more police action if necessary. But there have been problems. In December 2011, for instance, Surrey Street in Portsmouth was reported as having 136 crimes, when in fact it had just two. But there are more insidious problems. A survey by Direct Line Insurance in the same year found that 11% of respondents claim to have seen but not reported an incident because they feared it would make it more difficult to rent or sell their house. In general, the open data initiative ignores such feedback effects – that the very act of publishing the data will influence the quality of future data... Data is all very well, but the ability to extract meaningful information from it requires considerable skill. Without it, there is a real danger incorrect conclusions may be drawn. No technology is without concomitant risks, but provided we tread carefully, with an awareness of the problems, the open data initiative holds immense promise for a better society.”

Link:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/jul/10/open-data-force-for-good-risks?newsfeed=true

Updated:

08/16/2012, 06:08

From feeds:

Open Access Tracking Project (OATP) » abernard102@gmail.com

Tags:

oa.new oa.data oa.policies oa.comment oa.government oa.uk oa.data.gov.uk oa.benefits oa.privacy oa.white_paper

Authors:

abernard

Date tagged:

07/11/2012, 14:19

Date published:

07/11/2012, 14:38