DATA – Page 466 – The Living Library

Data Collaboratives: Matching Demand with Supply of (Corporate) Data to solve Public Problems

Curated on February 24, 2016August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Blog by Stefaan G. Verhulst, IrynaSusha and Alexander Kostura: “Data Collaboratives refer to a new form of collaboration, beyond the public-private partnership model, in which participants from different sectors (private companies, research institutions, and government agencies) share data to help solve public problems. Several of society’s greatest challenges — from climate change to poverty — require greater access to big (but not always open) data sets, more cross-sector collaboration, and increased capacity for data analysis. Participants at the workshop and breakout session explored the various ways in which data collaborative can help meet these needs.

Matching supply and demand of data emerged as one of the most important and overarching issues facing the big and open data communities. Participants agreed that more experimentation is needed so that new, innovative and more successful models of data sharing can be identified.

How to discover and enable such models? When asked how the international community might foster greater experimentation, participants indicated the need to develop the following:

· A responsible data framework that serves to build trust in sharing data would be based upon existing frameworks but also accommodates emerging technologies and practices. It would also need to be sensitive to public opinion and perception.

· Increased insight into different business models that may facilitate the sharing of data. As experimentation continues, the data community should map emerging practices and models of sharing so that successful cases can be replicated.

· Capacity to tap into the potential value of data. On the demand side,capacity refers to the ability to pose good questions, understand current data limitations, and seek new data sets responsibly. On the supply side, this means seeking shared value in collaboration, thinking creatively about public use of private data, and establishing norms of responsibility around security, privacy, and anonymity.

· Transparent stock of available data supply, including an inventory of what corporate data exist that can match multiple demands and that is shared through established networks and new collaborative institutional structures.

· Mapping emerging practices and models of sharing. Corporate data offers value not only for humanitarian action (which was a particular focus at the conference) but also for a variety of other domains, including science,agriculture, health care, urban development, environment, media and arts,and others. Gaining insight in the practices that emerge across sectors could broaden the spectrum of what is feasible and how.

In general, it was felt that understanding the business models underlying data collaboratives is of utmost importance in order to achieve win-win outcomes for both private and public sector players. Moreover, issues of public perception and trust were raised as important concerns of government organizations participating in data collaboratives….(More)”

Technology and the Future of Cities

Curated on February 24, 2016August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Mark Gorenberg, Craig Mundie, Eric Schmidt and Marjory Blumenthal at PCAST: “Growing urbanization presents the United States with an opportunity to showcase its innovation strength, grow its exports, and help to improve citizens’ lives – all at once. Seizing this triple opportunity will involve a concerted effort to develop and apply new technologies to enhance the way cities work for the people who live there.

A new report released today by the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST), Technology and the Future of Cities, lays out why now is a good time to promote technologies for cities: more (and more diverse) people are living in cities; people are increasingly open to different ways of using space, living, working, and traveling across town; physical infrastructures for transportation, energy, and water are aging; and a wide range of innovations are in reach that can yield better infrastructures and help in the design and operation of city services.

There are also new ways to collect and use information to design and operate systems and services. Better use of information can help make the most of limited resources – whether city budgets or citizens’ time – and help make sure that the neediest as well as the affluent benefit from new technology.

Although the vision of technology’s promise applies city-wide, PCAST suggests that a practical way for cities to adopt infrastructural and other innovation is by starting in a discrete area – a district, the dimensions of which depend on the innovation in question. Experiences in districts can help inform decisions elsewhere in a given city – and in other cities. PCAST urges broader sharing of information about, and tools for, innovation in cities.

Such sharing is already happening in isolated pockets focused on either specific kinds of information or recipients of specific kinds of funding. A more comprehensive City Web, achieved through broader interconnection, could inform and impel urban innovation. A systematic approach to developing open-data resources for cities is recommended, too.

PCAST recommends a variety of steps to make the most of the Federal Government’s engagement with cities. To begin, it calls for more – and more effective – coordination among Federal agencies that are key to infrastructural investments in cities. Coordination across agencies, of course, is the key to place-based policy. Building on the White House Smart Cities Initiative, which promotes not only R&D but also deployment of IT-based approaches to help cities solve challenges, PCAST also calls for expanding research and development coordination to include the physical, infrastructural technologies that are so fundamental to city services.

A new era of city design and city life is emerging. If the United States steers Federal investments in cities in ways that foster innovation, the impacts can be substantial. The rest of the world has also seen the potential, with numerous cities showcasing different approaches to innovation. The time to aim for leadership in urban technologies and urban science is now….(More)”

Public-Private Partnerships for Statistics: Lessons Learned, Future Steps

Curated on February 23, 2016August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Report by Nicholas Robin, Thilo Klein and Johannes Jütting for Paris 21: “Non-offcial sources of data, big data in particular, are currently attracting enormous interest in the world of official statistics. An impressive body of work focuses on how different types of big data (telecom data, social media, sensors, etc.) can be used to fll specifc data gaps, especially with regard to the post-2015 agenda and the associated technology challenges. The focus of this paper is on a different aspect, but one that is of crucial importance: what are the perspectives of the commercial operations and national statistical offces which respectively produce and might use this data and which incentives, business models and protocols are needed in order to leverage non-offcial data sources within the offcial statistics community?

Public-private partnerships (PPPs) offer signifcant opportunities such as cost effectiveness, timeliness, granularity, new indicators, but also present a range of challenges that need to be surmounted. These comprise technical diffculties, risks related to data confdentiality as well as a lack of incentives. Nevertheless, a number of collaborative projects have already emerged and can be

Nevertheless, a number of collaborative projects have already emerged and can be classified into four ideal types: namely the in-house production of statistics by the data provider, the transfer of private data sets to the end user, the transfer of private data sets to a trusted third party for processing and/or analysis, and the outsourcing of national statistical office functions (the only model which is not centred around a data-sharing dimension). In developing countries, a severe lack of resources and particular statistical needs (to adopt a system-wide approach within national statistical systems and fill statistical gaps which are relevant to national development plans) highlight the importance of harnessing the private sector’s resources and point to the most holistic models (in-house and third party) in which the private sector contributes to the processing and analysis of data. The following key lessons are drawn from four case studies….(More)”

Drones better than human rescuers at following mountain pathways

Curated on February 23, 2016July 19, 2019 by Stefaan Verhulst

Springwise: “Every year in Switzerland, emergency centers respond to around 1,000 call outs for lost and injured hikers. It can often take hours and significant manpower to locate lost mountaineers, but new software for quadcopter drones is making the hunt quicker and easier, and has the potential to help find human survivors in disaster zones around the world.

The drone uses a computer algorithm called a Deep Neural Network. The program was developed by researchers at the University of Zurich and the Dalle Molle Institute for Artificial Intelligence. The drone uses the algorithm to learn trails and paths through a pair of small cameras, interpreting the images and recognizing man-made pathways. Even when working on a previously unseen trail, it was able to guess the correct direction in 85 percent of the cases. The drones’ speed and accuracy make them more effective than human trackers.

Drohnen-Scaramuzza-2
The researchers hope that eventually multiple small drones could be combined with human search and rescue missions, to cover more terrain and find people faster. The drones can cover terrain quickly and check hazardous areas to minimize risk to human workers, and its AI can identify paths and avoid crashing without any human involvement….(More)”

The Digital Equilibrium Project

Curated on February 23, 2016November 14, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Press Release by The Digital Equilibrium Project: “Cybersecurity, government and privacy experts are banding together as part of The ‘Digital Equilibrium Project’ to foster a new, productive dialogue on balancing security and privacy in the connected world. The project aims to address the underlying issues fueling acrimonious debates like the contentious court order between Apple and the U.S. Government.

The diverse group includes current and former leaders of some of the world’s largest cybersecurity firms and organizations, former officials in the NSA and national law enforcement, and leaders of some of the nation’s most influential privacy organizations. These individuals believe new thinking and collaboration is needed to avert potential catastrophes as the digital and physical worlds become more interdependent.
The group will release its foundational paper ‘Balancing Security and Privacy in the Connected World’ on Tuesday, March 1^st at the RSA Conference – the world’s largest cybersecurity conference.
This project and related paper, months in the making, seek to end the kinds of standoffs we are seeing between Apple and the U.S. Government, addressing the underlying lack of social norms and legal constructs for the digital world.
They will convene a mid-year summit to craft a framework or ‘constitution’ for the digital world. The intent of this constitution is to help guide policy creation, broker compromise and serve as the foundation for decision making around cybersecurity issues. Senior executives from the Justice Department, Apple and other technology firms will be invited to participate…..

Next week the group will publish its foundational paper, crafted over extensive meetings, interviews and working sessions. The paper is meant to foster a new, collaborative discussion on the most pressing questions that could determine the future safety and social value of the Internet and the digital technologies that depend on it. In addition to releasing the paper at the RSA Conference, members of the group will discuss the paper and related issues during a main-stage panel session moderated by Art Coviello, former Executive Chairman of RSA Security, and James Kaplan, a McKinsey partner, on Thursday, March 3rd. Panel members will include: Michael Chertoff, Executive Chairman of The Chertoff Group and former Secretary of Homeland Security; Trevor Hughes, President and CEO of the International Association of Privacy Professionals; Mike McConnell, former Director of the NSA and Director, National Intelligence; and Nuala O’Connor, President and CEO, Center for Democracy & Technology.

The paper urges governments, corporations and privacy advocates to put aside the polarizing arguments that have cast security and privacy as opposing forces, and calls for a mid-year summit meeting between these parties to formulate a new structure for advancement of these pressing issues. It poses four fundamental questions that must be addressed to ensure the digital world can evolve in ways that ensure individual privacy while enabling the productivity and commercial gains that can improve quality of life around the globe. The four questions are:

What practices should organizations adopt to achieve their goals while protecting the privacy of their customers and other stakeholders?
How can organizations continue to improve the protection of their digital infrastructures and adopt privacy management practices that protect their employees?
What privacy management practices should governments adopt to maintain civil liberties and expectations of privacy, while ensuring the safety and security of their citizens, organizations, and critical infrastructure?
What norms should countries adopt to protect their sovereignty while enabling global commerce and collaboration against criminal and terrorist threats?

The Digital Equilibrium Project’s foundational paper will available for download on March 1^st at www.digitalequilibriumproject.com”

Open Data Button

Curated on February 23, 2016August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Open Access Button: “Hidden data is hindering research, and we’re tired of it. Next week we’ll release the Open Data Button beta as part of Open Data Day. The Open Data Button will help people find, release, and share the data behind papers. We need your support to share, test, and improve the Open Data Button. Today, we’re going to provide some in depth info about the tool.

You’ll be able to download the free Open Data Button on the 29th of February. Follow the launch conversation on Twitter and at #opendatabutton.

How the Open Data Button works

You will be able to download the Open Data Button on Chrome, and later on Firefox. When you need the data supporting a paper (even if it’s behind a paywall), push the Button. If the data has already been made available through the Open Data Button, we’ll give you a link. If it hasn’t, youâll be able to start a request for the data. Eventually, we want to search a variety of other sources for it – but can’t yet (read on, we need your help with that).

The request will be sent to the author. We know sharing data can be hard and there’s sometimes good reasons not to. The author will be able to respond to it by saying how long it’ll take to share the data – or if they can’t. If the data is already available, the author can simply share a URL to the dataset. If it isn’t, they can attach files to a response for us to make available. Files shared with us will be deposited in the Open Science Framework for identification and archiving. The Open Science Framework supports data sharing for all disciplines. As much metadata as possible will be obtained from the paper, the rest we’ll ask the author for.

The progress of this request is tracked through our new “request” pages. On request pages others can support a request and be sent a copy of the data when it’s available. We’ll map requests, and stories will be searchable – both will now be embeddable objects.

Once available, we’ll send data to people who’ve requested it. You can award an Open Data Badge to the author if there’s enough supporting information to reproduce the data’s results.

At first we’ll only have a Chrome add-on, but support for Firefox will be available from Firefox 46. Support for a bookmarklet will also be provided, but we don’t have a release date yet….(More)”

Cities want to get smarter, so why is it taking so long?

Curated on February 23, 2016August 15, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Kevin Ebi at Smart Cities Council: “Most cities and utilities want to get smarter. They see the smart cities movement as delivering more than some incremental improvement. They see it as a meaningful transformation — one that delivers far more than just some cost savings.

Despite all that, the latest Black & Veatch Strategic Directions: U.S. Smart City/Smart Utility Report finds they plan to move slower — not faster — to become smarter. But understanding the obstacles can help you overcome them.

First, the good news
Cities don’t need to be sold on the idea of becoming smarter. More than 90% see the smart cities movement as being transformational with long-term lasting impacts.

Nearly 80% believe it should start with initiatives that have lasting benefits — even if that work is largely behind the scenes (and therefore less likely for the public to notice.) A similar number also believe that data analytics will significantly improve decision making. And nearly all believe it’s a comprehensive effort; it’s more than just buying some new technology.

The smart cities revolution is also inclusive. More than three-quarters say that energy, water and telecommunications providers should play a leadership role in smart cities initiatives — they shouldn’t be relegated to a supporting role.

And growing numbers see smart cities initiatives as something more than just a vehicle to cut costs. This year, more respondents — cities leaders and utilities alike — see the potential to become more sustainable, better manage community resources and to attract business investment.

But there’s also room for improvement
Despite clearly understanding the value of smart cities initiatives, the survey finds respondents are losing faith the transition can happen quickly. Last year, the study found that nearly 1 in 5 thought the smart cities model would be widespread in American cities within the next five years. This year, not even 1 in 10 believe that timeline is achievable.

Instead, more than a third now believe the implementation could take a decade. Nearly a quarter believe it could take 15 years. More than 80% believe the U.S. is lagging the world in the smart cities revolution.

What’s holding them back
Part of the problem may be a big knowledge gap. While people responding to the survey say they understand the potential, more than half say their city still doesn’t understand what it means to be a “smart city.”

And while half the cities and utilities are assessing their readiness — a third are even working on roadmaps — nearly two-thirds still don’t understand where the payoff point is. That may be adding to the money woes….(More)”

Crowd2Map Tanzania

Curated on February 22, 2016August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

“Crowd2Map Tanzania is a new crowdsourcing initiative aimed at creating a comprehensive map ofTanzania, including detailed depictions of all of its villages, roads and public resources (such as schools, shops, offices etc.) in OpenStreetMap and/or Google Maps, both of which are sadly rather poor at the moment. (For a convincing example, see our post about a not-so-blank-as-map-suggests Zeze village here.)

…In February 2016, Crowd2Map Tanzania was one of the 7 projects selected in the Open Seventeenchallenge, which rallies the public to use open data as a means of achieving the 17 SustainableDevelopment Goals as proposed but the UN in September 2015! We are now excited to carry on with the helpof O17 partners – Citizen Cyberlab, The GovLab, ONE and SciFabric! We’re tackling Goal 11: creatingsustainable cities & communities and Goal 4: education through technology….(More)

Forecasting Domestic Violence: A Machine Learning Approach to Help Inform Arraignment Decisions

Curated on February 22, 2016August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Richard A. Berk, Susan B. Sorenson and Geoffrey Barnes in the The Journal of Empirical Legal Studies: “Arguably the most important decision at an arraignment is whether to release an offender until the date of his or her next scheduled court appearance. Under the Bail Reform Act of 1984, threats to public safety can be a key factor in that decision. Implicitly, a forecast of “future dangerousness” is required. In this article, we consider in particular whether usefully accurate forecasts of domestic violence can be obtained. We apply machine learning to data on over 28,000 arraignment cases from a major metropolitan area in which an offender faces domestic violence charges. One of three possible post-arraignment outcomes is forecasted within two years: (1) a domestic violence arrest associated with a physical injury, (2) a domestic violence arrest not associated with a physical injury, and (3) no arrests for domestic violence. We incorporate asymmetric costs for different kinds of forecasting errors so that very strong statistical evidence is required before an offender is forecasted to be a good risk. When an out-of-sample forecast of no post-arraignment domestic violence arrests within two years is made, it is correct about 90 percent of the time. Under current practice within the jurisdiction studied, approximately 20 percent of those released after an arraignment for domestic violence are arrested within two years for a new domestic violence offense. If magistrates used the methods we have developed and released only offenders forecasted not to be arrested for domestic violence within two years after an arraignment, as few as 10 percent might be arrested. The failure rate could be cut nearly in half. Over a typical 24-month period in the jurisdiction studied, well over 2,000 post-arraignment arrests for domestic violence perhaps could be averted….(More)”