Open data as infrastructure

How can open data be used as infrastructure, for public use? Popular privacy arguments aside — given that governments already have our data, in what ethical ways can this data be used to improve our lives?

As a starting point, I look to Estonia’s proposed data embassies. Data embassies refer to the state-controlled, backed-up governmental data outside of the domestic country. Why do we need this? I will let the government’s ICT policy advisor, Siim Sikkut, explain.

As stated on the E-Estonia site:

“we have back-up data storage facilities in Estonia, but in order to be prepared for any occasion, if, for example, the state suffers a large-scale cyber-attack, natural disaster or a conventional attack on a data centre — we need back-up sites outside our borders…cloud technology provides a good opportunity, but the state also wants to maintain the full control and jurisdiction of their data and systems. For this reason the private cloud services are not exactly suitable for [the government],” he said. “Therefore, we started to develop and enhance the data embassy concept, just like Estonian embassies abroad, these are our sovereign embassies in foreign data centres.”

Here, our data is held within embassies not only for protection, but to ensure private companies are not beholden it. This is an important distinction. Imagine if you were informed of each time your data was accessed by governments, much like when you get notifications from Google if your account was accessed by an unfamiliar source. Would you be comfortable with your data being used in this way? If it were the case, you could call your government, much like your credit card company, to stop the accessing of your data. Within this system, you could do this domestically and internationally in addition to accessing your government documents digitally, securely, rather than mailing original documents overseas. As we move around the globe for travel and work, send remittances across borders, volunteer our services abroad, this is a conversation which increasingly needs to centre and critically consider ethics within international digital policy.