Q2. What are the future works in "Opening up government data for big data analysis and public benefit author" ?
The important and difficult task for the future will be learning how to strike the right balance between releasing government data for public benefit whilst ensuring that this same level of concern for individual privacy is maintained.
Q3. What is the other major hurdle to releasing government data?
The other major hurdle to releasing government data is a public service culture which is yet to fully embrace the open data movement.
Q4. Why are agencies reluctant to release data?
Because of uncertainty over the reliability of de-identification, agencies remain reluctant to release the data they collect because it might be combined with other data sources to reveal private details about Australian citizens.
Q5. What are the main reasons why the Australian government is releasing data?
The paper argues that the Australian government will likely face ongoing challenges in meeting its open data targets due to barriers that are technical, legal and cultural: namely, ongoing uncertainty as to the reliability of de-identification, broad protections for personal information in national privacy legislation, and a public service culture which continues to favour the secrecy of information over public release.
Q6. What are the main principles of the Open Data Charter?
It comprises six key principles, which state that data should be:(1) Open by default (2) Timely and comprehensive (3) Accessible and usable (4) Comparable and interoperable (5) For improved governance and citizen engagement (6) For inclusive development and innovation10Importantly, these principles do not include protecting individual privacy.
Q7. What is the Australian government’s concern about releasing data to the public?
It is encouraging that much of the Australian government’s concerns about releasing data to the public relate to protecting individual privacy.
Q8. What is the third major barrier to opening up government data?
Reluctance to release data under the Privacy Act has become so common that the acronym ‘BOTPA’ (Because Of The Privacy Act) has become shorthand for agencies refusing to share their data, even with other government agencies and where disclosure would not actually breach the requirements of the Privacy Act.51The third major barrier to opening up government data is a public service culture which appears to favour secrecy of information as the default position.
Q9. How long will it take to achieve something similar to the open data ideal?
Despite the Australian government’s strong commitments to the open data movement, then, it will likely take a significant time – certainly several terms of government and perhaps up to a decade or more – to achieve something resembling the open data ideal.
Q10. What is the meaning of the phrase "Re-identification"?
In one high-profile study, for example, two Netflix users were re-identified from anonymised data which was offered publicly by that company in order to improve its movie recommendation service.
Q11. What is the reason for the reluctance of Australian government agencies to release such policy?
57 Reluctance to release such policy data appears to be driven to a large extent by concerns about protecting individual privacy.
Q12. What is the purpose of the Australian Government Technical Interoperability Framework?
This is the purpose of the Australian Government Technical Interoperability Framework – which sets out national standards for consistently describing and encoding government data – but this framework is now more than a decade old and should be updated.
Q13. Why is there a strong case for releasing government data?
41At the same time, there is a strong case for releasing much of the statistical and policy data produced by government agencies in order to drive innovation and improve transparency and accountability.
Q14. What is the way to overcome the reluctance of Australian government agencies to release?
As for other countries seeking to open up greater amounts of their data, achieving sufficiently reliable de-identification procedures in Australia will take time – particularly for the cost of these techniques to reduce sufficiently so that all government agencies can apply them on a larger scale.
Q15. Why are some categories of data subject to privacy protections?
For this reason, these categories of data are subject to stringent privacy protections, including in some cases the possibility of criminal penalty for disclosure.