Andrea Di MaioWhile the echo of a thrilling and successful Gov 2.0 Summit still resounds in the Beltway and beyond, I want to complete the sequence of sobering and somewhat pessimistic observations I have purposely been posting this week to counterbalance hype and enthusiasm.
According to an article published by Government Executive,
… Hundreds of thousands of Americans have been ripped off by con artists promising free government funds through the Recovery Act, a top federal watchdog testified during a congressional oversight hearing on Thursday…
… Many of these schemes require consumers to pay substantial amounts of money in a fruitless attempt to obtain a much larger grant. Others simply ask consumers to provide personal information, or send a very small payment to get information on how to get free government grant money…
… In total, at least 270,000 Americans have been duped out of roughly $30 million
These have not been the first and won’t be the last on-line scams that target government information and service users. However one needs to reflect about whether and how open government data that can be mashed up and aggregated by third parties may constitute an additional avenue for fraudulent activities.
What if a third party service uses only a subset of the government data and replace others with fake or inaccurate data to influence user behaviors and purchases? For instance, a realtor web site may misrepresent data about – say – air or water quality to influence the price of a particular property. Most likely the web site would mash up loads of information about amenities, shops, schools, transportation, coming from both government and private service providers. How can a user know that those data are being accurately mashed up and they are not being selectively picked up or event replaced by the masher?
What if the ability to access and integrate lots of government data helps give credibility and a sense of a trust into an organization that would look otherwise quite questionable? For instance, a crook could qualify as a trusted business advisor to small and medium size businesses by being smart at mashing up demographic, education, environment and economic data. How many more con artists will open data create or legitimate?
I am firmly convinced that open government data will generate far more good than evil, and that the latter is a natural component of any human activity. One can just hope that with more eyes watching for each other, illegal or unethical behaviors will be easier to intercept. But this requires a recognition that – indeed – it is not all gold that glitters.
Category: open government data Tags: American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, government 2.0
16 responses so far ↓
1 Twitter Trackbacks for Open Government: It Is Not All Gold That Glitters [gartner.com] on Topsy.com September 11, 2009 at 11:04 am
[...] Open Government: It Is Not All Gold That Glitters blogs.gartner.com/andrea_dimaio/2009/09/11/open-government-it-is-not-all-gold-that-glitters – view page – cached While the echo of a thrilling and successful Gov 2.0 Summit still resounds in the Beltway and beyond, I want to complete the sequence of sobering and somewhat pessimistic observations I have purposely been posting this week to counterbalance hype and enthusiasm. — From the page [...]
2 Alorza September 11, 2009 at 11:17 am
OK, Andrea, but isn’t this a trivial observation?
Every new thing, every new technology, carries both good and bad consequences. When good consequences are much bigger than the bad ones, we normally adopt the new thing.
Is there something more I can’t see?
3 Andrea Di Maio September 11, 2009 at 11:23 am
@Alorza – indeed it is and it is meant to be. But how comes that people seems to forget? How comes that when we try to figure out the value that open data can create, awards go to relatively straightforward examples? As I said in yesterday’s post, we need to be more ambitious and focused in showing value, but also more through in exploring risks. Risks that may seriously undermine what governments are trying to do to gain their citizen’s trust by using new technologies.
4 PaulGeraghty September 12, 2009 at 6:38 am
What a good example of what could go wrong.
The question is what steps could be taken to negate this type of abuse?
Just because I, as masher#1 sign an agreement not to alter the values of a data-set does not mean that masher#2 can take my data and reuse it.
Unless maybe :
-the terms of any licence are viral
-registration is required before you can use the data
It is hard to see how technology can come to the rescue here, unless “semantic search” can accurately identify the various islands upon which this data surfaces.
5 Brian Ahier September 13, 2009 at 1:10 am
I agree that we need to be cautious, but you are also correct “that open government data will generate far more good than evil.”
I wonder if strong regulations on the use of government data are necessary as the data is released…
If a mashup includes an official government data set, then it makes sense that we should try to ensure that the integrated data from other sources is clean – this could get very tricky!
6 A Few Questions While Waiting for the Open Government Directive September 14, 2009 at 8:08 am
[...] ← Open Government: It Is Not All Gold That Glitters [...]
7 Open Data and Application Contests: Government 2.0 at the Peak of Inflated Expectations September 22, 2009 at 4:44 am
[...] is likely to cost a lot to both government and taxpayers. Another client observed (as I said in a previous post) that there is no way people will be able to tell to what extent a mash up on an application [...]
8 Misunderstanding and understanding the Open Data Hype | eaves.ca September 25, 2009 at 9:17 pm
[...] is likely to cost a lot to both government and taxpayers. Another client observed (as I said in a previous post) that there is no way people will be able to tell to what extent a mash up on an application [...]
9 Why Government 2.0 Has Little To Do With Government October 6, 2009 at 5:11 am
[...] policy boundaries. While legal entities (such as enterprises or professionals) are liable for misusing or misrepresenting information, will people be able to sue a community or an individual for an incorrect mash-up? Will law [...]
10 How Do I Know That I Am Using Government Data? October 7, 2009 at 7:13 am
[...] a previous post I raised, amongst others, the issue of authenticity and quality of open government data. Yesterday, [...]
11 ¿Quiénes harán el Open Government, dirigentes y políticos? October 8, 2009 at 4:08 am
[...] al debate que sostenemos desde hace unos años, pero al que no hemos podido definir con suficiente pertinencia, al menos desde nuestro punto de [...]
12 Gustavo Julio García Vega October 8, 2009 at 11:26 am
Clarifying the post, we quote a warning that there is some confusion. Apparently the strategic factor of open government is being sacrificed in favor of leaving the main eAdministration the accessory below ..
Greetings!
neocivis.es
13 Why Challenging the Pathological Transparency of Technology Makes Sense October 13, 2009 at 1:50 pm
[...] Over the last few days there has been quite some debate about an article Against Transparency by Lawrence Lessig. In this article Lessig, who ironically sits on the advisory board of the Sunlight Foundation, looks at the dark side of transparency, something I have touched upon in a couple of previous posts (see here and here). [...]
14 Government 2.0; Damned If You Do, Damned If You Don’t December 4, 2009 at 4:27 am
[...] earlier posts (see here, here and here) as well as in a presentation I gave at our Symposia in Orlando and Sydney I [...]
15 The UK Joins the Open Government Data Train January 21, 2010 at 5:57 am
[...] who is using government data sets, for what purpose and what value they add as well as what risks they pose. What if open government data is misused by mashing it up with wrong or intentionally [...]
16 From Government as a Platform to Citizens as a Platform February 3, 2010 at 10:55 am
[...] pointing to a blog post by Nat Torkington about Rethinking Open Data, which makes the same case I’ve been making for quite some time. What was even more remarkable is that in his tweet Tim says “Funny, I was in DC last week saying [...]