The Wikileaks debacle has many people calling for restrictions on information sharing - it must be all the innovation since 9/11 that is putting us at risk - right?
Wrong. There has hardly been any innovation and widespread upgrades of information sharing technology - the systems that were compromised were likely designed in the 60's and 70's, deployed years later, and patched into the 21st century.
The fact that someone could download everything to a thumb drive undetected is crazy - and if detection was possible - who was asleep at the wheel?
Moving our inforamtion sharing capabilities to some new approaches will continue to be the answer - we're not going to make the proverbial sow's ear into a silk purse no matter how many defense contractors we put on the job.
It seems the world is moving too fast for the government to keep up, and that this is just another example. There will be a hue and cry for more money to spend plugging the leaks (pun intended), but the reality is that the infrastructure is caving in from its own weight, and can't be fixed fast enough. There are plenty of people willing to throw money at the problem, and an even greater throng willing to catch it and make promises of fixes to come.
Thursday, December 2, 2010
Friday, November 5, 2010
Banks form Interoperable Data Center Alliance
banks consort on interoperable data centers
Great article - the banks are getting on the interoperability band wagon and looking at standardizing the cloud environment. We might move out of the "Proprietary Age" of IT and into the standardized data world. This seems like an enternity, but if you realize that electronic computer sytsems are less than 75 years old, it is amazing progresss. The short term and long term gains of stndardardized data sets combined with cloud computing may make local server farms and proprietary approaches as quaint as an early factory running all of machines off belts from a centrally powered shaft!
Great article - the banks are getting on the interoperability band wagon and looking at standardizing the cloud environment. We might move out of the "Proprietary Age" of IT and into the standardized data world. This seems like an enternity, but if you realize that electronic computer sytsems are less than 75 years old, it is amazing progresss. The short term and long term gains of stndardardized data sets combined with cloud computing may make local server farms and proprietary approaches as quaint as an early factory running all of machines off belts from a centrally powered shaft!
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
Radio Interoperability - NOT!!!!
http://www.wkrg.com/caught_on_camera/article/accidentally-caught-on-camera-car-crash-not-part-of-movie/1078904/Oct-12-2010_10-26-am/
I thought the billions of dollars spent in the last 8 years since 9/11 on radio interoperability would have at least prevented this police care from crashing into a movie set - apparently being supported by a different set of police and different radios!!!!!
I thought the billions of dollars spent in the last 8 years since 9/11 on radio interoperability would have at least prevented this police care from crashing into a movie set - apparently being supported by a different set of police and different radios!!!!!
Interoperable data for turbulent times
The economy is certainly having some severe problems on many fronts, and many businesses are looking for ways to improve their long term viability and short term productivity. Investing in interoperable data infrastructure is a very solid investment.
Like the adoption of the shipping container, the use of structured, interoperable data will have some immediate benefits in terms of easing sharing and accessing information. The real payoffs will come as this creates a cumulative effect and begins to impact software design. Software applications that plug together like Legos through defined data sets can be rapidly deployed and morphed as business requirements change; far better than legacy systems that need extensive, custom interfaces to be developed before any synergies can be obtained.
If you are a business owner, a CIO, deal with massive amounts of data, or an information architect, you need to be thinking about this as a critical element of your strategy over the next 5-10 years.
Like the adoption of the shipping container, the use of structured, interoperable data will have some immediate benefits in terms of easing sharing and accessing information. The real payoffs will come as this creates a cumulative effect and begins to impact software design. Software applications that plug together like Legos through defined data sets can be rapidly deployed and morphed as business requirements change; far better than legacy systems that need extensive, custom interfaces to be developed before any synergies can be obtained.
If you are a business owner, a CIO, deal with massive amounts of data, or an information architect, you need to be thinking about this as a critical element of your strategy over the next 5-10 years.
Monday, September 13, 2010
House, Senate agree on measure requiring standard format for spending data
http://www.nextgov.com/nextgov/ng_20100908_9226.php?oref=rss?zone=NGtoday
Standard format for spending data - while this seems almost common sensical, it is a big step forward for the government. The idea of agencies doing things the same way is a major opportunity to eventually streamline government at the federal level, and eventually filter this down to the states and local level.
It also allows interface to business, making the entire process simplier, faster, more efficient and ultimately less expensive. There are millions if not billions of dollars spent on proprietary interfaces for data today. Kudos to the people thinking out of the box!
Standard format for spending data - while this seems almost common sensical, it is a big step forward for the government. The idea of agencies doing things the same way is a major opportunity to eventually streamline government at the federal level, and eventually filter this down to the states and local level.
It also allows interface to business, making the entire process simplier, faster, more efficient and ultimately less expensive. There are millions if not billions of dollars spent on proprietary interfaces for data today. Kudos to the people thinking out of the box!
Friday, August 13, 2010
Alzheimers and info sharing...
New York Times:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/13/health/research/13alzheimer.html?_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss
A great story of why remembering to share information is so important!!!
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/13/health/research/13alzheimer.html?_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss
A great story of why remembering to share information is so important!!!
Thursday, August 5, 2010
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Standards portend alternatives....See Facebook competitor
See the below threat to FACEBOOK, and you see the power of standards and cognitive intelligence (Clay Shirkey's new book). Imagine a distributed, open, free social networking capability, and there are lots of possibilities that come to mind....
From WIRED.com.....
1. Open, Distributed Alternatives
A pack of college kids drunk on Free Software launched an open-source, federated alternative to Facebook called Diaspora. After collecting an astonishing $120K in donations, the group is knocking out code. Meanwhile, there’s other cool stuff going on, including OneSocialWeb, the Appleseed Project and WebFinger. Get enough of these open protcols into decent shape and someone is likely to build them into an improbably powerful stack. Research the LAMP stack, if you don’t get my drift.
What might that look like? An elimination of the need for a centralized home and coordinator of social networking — where your social profile lives wherever you want it to (as your e-mail does) and can interact with any other profile around the net, on your own terms.
While it sounds far fetched, a recent poll suggests that people are as happy with Facebook as they are with their cable company, even if they do find it similarly indispensable.
Read More http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/07/five-things-totopple-facebooks-empire/#ixzz0uKFKoRLU
From WIRED.com.....
1. Open, Distributed Alternatives
A pack of college kids drunk on Free Software launched an open-source, federated alternative to Facebook called Diaspora. After collecting an astonishing $120K in donations, the group is knocking out code. Meanwhile, there’s other cool stuff going on, including OneSocialWeb, the Appleseed Project and WebFinger. Get enough of these open protcols into decent shape and someone is likely to build them into an improbably powerful stack. Research the LAMP stack, if you don’t get my drift.
What might that look like? An elimination of the need for a centralized home and coordinator of social networking — where your social profile lives wherever you want it to (as your e-mail does) and can interact with any other profile around the net, on your own terms.
While it sounds far fetched, a recent poll suggests that people are as happy with Facebook as they are with their cable company, even if they do find it similarly indispensable.
Read More http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/07/five-things-totopple-facebooks-empire/#ixzz0uKFKoRLU
Monday, July 19, 2010
5 Billion Wireless connections!!!
http://www.mobilefuture.org/blog/archives/global_wireless_subscriptions_surpass_5_billion/
5 billion wireless connections is a standards triumph - think about all those bits trying to move if they had not been somewhat standardized. There are some issues to be resolved with the different networks, and generational issues as the new starts to supercede the very usable basic stuff that will be around for a long time. The rate of addition seems a little high, but as things like IP6 and very inexpensive sensors start to take off, it may accelerate rather than plateau.
Who would have thunk it? DHS needs to share information
http://http://www.nextgov.com/nextgov/ng_20100716_2491.php?oref=rss?zone=NGtoday
DHS figured out it needs to share information and consolidate intelligence into one shareable portal. Wow.
DHS figured out it needs to share information and consolidate intelligence into one shareable portal. Wow.
Thursday, July 8, 2010
innovation and interoperability
Mention standards, and many eyes glaze over - too hard, too long, not good. I'd ask you to rethink this.
It is important to understand that much of our rapid innovation has come from building on top of standard approaches! If you look at the applications on the Internet (Amazon, Facebook, YouTube, and 1000 more), they all took advantage of TCP/IP, HTML and other standards that allowed for the amazing global growth of the internet.
So take a look at what you can adopt and adapt into your processes that might make for a giant leap forward - building on the shoulder of giants and rapidly emerging, new standard ways of doing things. A good example is QR codes - 2 dimensional bar codes that can hold much more information than a traditional bar code and be read by the newest generation of phones - Iphone, Android, and others.
If you are using interoperable data and standards as a footing, your speed willl pick up as well - others are doing the work for you and allowing more linkages, more outside applications, and better understanding.
It is important to understand that much of our rapid innovation has come from building on top of standard approaches! If you look at the applications on the Internet (Amazon, Facebook, YouTube, and 1000 more), they all took advantage of TCP/IP, HTML and other standards that allowed for the amazing global growth of the internet.
So take a look at what you can adopt and adapt into your processes that might make for a giant leap forward - building on the shoulder of giants and rapidly emerging, new standard ways of doing things. A good example is QR codes - 2 dimensional bar codes that can hold much more information than a traditional bar code and be read by the newest generation of phones - Iphone, Android, and others.
If you are using interoperable data and standards as a footing, your speed willl pick up as well - others are doing the work for you and allowing more linkages, more outside applications, and better understanding.
Interoperable data and cost savings
I doubt that I need to outline the world economic downturn going on - but the latest thinking is that we're headed for a double dip recession, or a prolonged period of very slow growth with a high number of unemployed workers nationwide. Time to think about how to cut costs and enhance an organization's capabilities:
A strong interoperable data approach lays the groundwork for lower costs over the coming years:
1. Far less custom development needs to take place
2. Outside managed providers can be linked in easily, allowing pay as you go approaches
3. Tools to manage and maintain the data can be more standardized
4. Partner (known and unknown) interaction can happen faster, giving more flexibility
5. Reliance and costs for customer applications can be reduced
Much like the introduction of the shipping container, once the initial change resistance has been overcome, and once the vision becomes clear, the new process can accelerate rapidly and have many positive impacts not anticipated in the early project days.
A strong interoperable data approach lays the groundwork for lower costs over the coming years:
1. Far less custom development needs to take place
2. Outside managed providers can be linked in easily, allowing pay as you go approaches
3. Tools to manage and maintain the data can be more standardized
4. Partner (known and unknown) interaction can happen faster, giving more flexibility
5. Reliance and costs for customer applications can be reduced
Much like the introduction of the shipping container, once the initial change resistance has been overcome, and once the vision becomes clear, the new process can accelerate rapidly and have many positive impacts not anticipated in the early project days.
Thursday, June 24, 2010
Glimmers of progresss....
I just saw an article on Data.gov and the move to move many of the feeds there into a map based environment. Kudos for the administration toward moving that direction and also making the information available in feed format for use by other applications.
Another article this morning touted agencies use of sensors over the coming years - lower prices, better communications capability, smaller size and increased capabilities make this approach a winner. The data is all structured when it comes from sensors, and an increasing number of them are incorporating standard transaction formats so that they can be automatically linked into existing applications.
Talk is cheap on both accounts, but I'm encouraged to see movement, however small. Building an interopeable environment will allow all organizations to effectively share information better and more effectively. Building the data bridges that will allow sharing worldwide will pay some amazing benefits to every type of application.
Another article this morning touted agencies use of sensors over the coming years - lower prices, better communications capability, smaller size and increased capabilities make this approach a winner. The data is all structured when it comes from sensors, and an increasing number of them are incorporating standard transaction formats so that they can be automatically linked into existing applications.
Talk is cheap on both accounts, but I'm encouraged to see movement, however small. Building an interopeable environment will allow all organizations to effectively share information better and more effectively. Building the data bridges that will allow sharing worldwide will pay some amazing benefits to every type of application.
Sunday, June 6, 2010
When is interoperability a sham?
Dr David Boyd testified in front of Congress that equipment developed under the P25 moniker doesn't mean it is interoperable.
What?
http://www.fiercegovernmentit.com/story/boyd-p25-doesnt-necessarily-mean-interoperable/2010-06-01
DHS (or their pre-cursors) has been working on this problem since people died on 9/11, and it seems we're n0 closer to a radio being able to interact seamlessly with others. Is radio truely more complicated than telephones or the IP networks that support the Internet? I don't think so.
Vendor self interest, good old boy networks, and a host of other reasons have continued to plague this whole area. When will it get fixed? Likely when a disaster happens, people die or property destroyed, and the public is shown by the news media that everything is pretty much incompatible and that we've spent billions as a country. There will be a hue and cry, a search for a scapegoat, immediate regulations proposed, lobbyists rushing to pour water on the flames, and little real change if history is our guide.
P25 has been around for 21 years an effort to standardize radios.
What?
http://www.fiercegovernmentit.com/story/boyd-p25-doesnt-necessarily-mean-interoperable/2010-06-01
DHS (or their pre-cursors) has been working on this problem since people died on 9/11, and it seems we're n0 closer to a radio being able to interact seamlessly with others. Is radio truely more complicated than telephones or the IP networks that support the Internet? I don't think so.
Vendor self interest, good old boy networks, and a host of other reasons have continued to plague this whole area. When will it get fixed? Likely when a disaster happens, people die or property destroyed, and the public is shown by the news media that everything is pretty much incompatible and that we've spent billions as a country. There will be a hue and cry, a search for a scapegoat, immediate regulations proposed, lobbyists rushing to pour water on the flames, and little real change if history is our guide.
P25 has been around for 21 years an effort to standardize radios.
Thursday, May 27, 2010
Disruptathon!
I attended a Disruptathon last night (May 26) at the British Embassy. Put together by Pete Ericson, and hosted in part by Cynergy, it was a great gathering of individuals that were looking at what they were innovating now, and where innovation could go in the future.
The topic was government 2.0 and mobile innovation. Lots of great ideas on how the governnment could use mobile to be more productive internally, and also use mobile applications and their existing data streams to leverage outside mobile application developers.
Interoperability was a key - and the fact that smartphones were still oriented toward a leading edge segment of the population. Many of the organizations working today are using least common denominator standards like SMS to insure that they can get the message across.
This is an area of explosive growth, and there are many different features like geolocation that are under utilized today in the mobile phone arena. As more applications become more capable of utilizing these inherent features, and as more of the advanced phones move toward some kind of unified development environment, the state of the art will advance more rapidly.
Kudos to the organizers of this event.
The topic was government 2.0 and mobile innovation. Lots of great ideas on how the governnment could use mobile to be more productive internally, and also use mobile applications and their existing data streams to leverage outside mobile application developers.
Interoperability was a key - and the fact that smartphones were still oriented toward a leading edge segment of the population. Many of the organizations working today are using least common denominator standards like SMS to insure that they can get the message across.
This is an area of explosive growth, and there are many different features like geolocation that are under utilized today in the mobile phone arena. As more applications become more capable of utilizing these inherent features, and as more of the advanced phones move toward some kind of unified development environment, the state of the art will advance more rapidly.
Kudos to the organizers of this event.
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Data the key to mobile apps
There are 4 major players in the "smart and getting smarter" mobile space; Apple, Google, RIM and Microsoft - you can argue about the order, but in my mind they are the only meaningful players for the next 5 years.
I'm partial to the momentum and openness of the Android OS, but everyone will decide which phone they want a different way. Key will be the availability of killer apps on multiple platforms.
The key to emerging killer apps working across phones will be the inherent data that is associated with the application, and how interoperable it can be between phones. This is pretty easily done if you are sending Twitter messages, but can get pretty complicated when you are assuming things like geospatial awareness or other complex functions that might be implemented differently on different phones.
Standards will become important, and those standards will also help drive other apps into being - kiosks will be dropping in price, the IPAD and non-Apple competitors to the IPAD will be ramping up sales dramatically, and the number of applications using standardized data will increase dramatically.
Standardizing the data will also help reduce the number of redundant applications - RSS eliminated a host of proprietary ways of transmitting simple information between websites.
You will see some very intelligent applications that get smarter based on all the information flowing through their databases and being improved by both analytics, data points from people, and data points from sensors - the cost of which is dropping rapidly.
I'm partial to the momentum and openness of the Android OS, but everyone will decide which phone they want a different way. Key will be the availability of killer apps on multiple platforms.
The key to emerging killer apps working across phones will be the inherent data that is associated with the application, and how interoperable it can be between phones. This is pretty easily done if you are sending Twitter messages, but can get pretty complicated when you are assuming things like geospatial awareness or other complex functions that might be implemented differently on different phones.
Standards will become important, and those standards will also help drive other apps into being - kiosks will be dropping in price, the IPAD and non-Apple competitors to the IPAD will be ramping up sales dramatically, and the number of applications using standardized data will increase dramatically.
Standardizing the data will also help reduce the number of redundant applications - RSS eliminated a host of proprietary ways of transmitting simple information between websites.
You will see some very intelligent applications that get smarter based on all the information flowing through their databases and being improved by both analytics, data points from people, and data points from sensors - the cost of which is dropping rapidly.
Sunday, May 16, 2010
The data sharing imperative - an irresistable force
If you deal with data in any way (and you do), get ready for the world to start sharing data at a faster rate, in much more detail, and organized where many more people can use it for a much wider set of purposes. You can help it happen, watch it happen, or later wonder "what happened?"
Standardized data vocabularies will make this all possible. I examine this topic in detail in my book "Silver Bullets - how interoperable data will revolutionize information sharing and transparency". The "plumbing" is all coming into focus, with a wide array of data formats having been developed over that last several years, and many more in the works.
Why is this an imperative? Data collection is too expensive a task for everyone to take on, and the decreasing cost of publishing and consuming data is less than doing without. Let's take a traffic example - if a manufacturer has 2 plants on each side of Chicago, and needs to route critical parts shipments back and forth - there are a variety of things that can impact the flow of materials and production.
a: actual location - easy to pinpoint and map today
b. Traffic: Many cities are starting to make traffic cameras available, and mapping packages like Microsoft Bing have a real time capability to show major thoroughfare bottlenecks.
c. Weather: NOAA and other weather providers are identifying severe weather ahead of time, and making those alerts easily consumable.
d. Events: Where did that neighborhood parade come from?
These are just some of the simple sharing items that can occur - when you combine business partner interactions, government to private sector notifications, movement of data between government layers (federal, state, local), and all the other types of shareable data, there is much to choose from.
Standardized collection of all these data types and the distribution to a wide array of mobile devices will change the fabric of our lives in 20 years. Data will be available where needed (increasingly from automated sensors in a structured form) to make better decisions. It will impact us in every aspect of our lives - especially as video becomes smarter and provides data as well as images.
Will there be negative backlash - of course? Will there be breakdowns and shortfalls? Undoubtedly. Privacy violations? Many. Will the inexorable push forward continue? Absolutely - just like the glaciers in the Ice Age.
Standardized data vocabularies will make this all possible. I examine this topic in detail in my book "Silver Bullets - how interoperable data will revolutionize information sharing and transparency". The "plumbing" is all coming into focus, with a wide array of data formats having been developed over that last several years, and many more in the works.
Why is this an imperative? Data collection is too expensive a task for everyone to take on, and the decreasing cost of publishing and consuming data is less than doing without. Let's take a traffic example - if a manufacturer has 2 plants on each side of Chicago, and needs to route critical parts shipments back and forth - there are a variety of things that can impact the flow of materials and production.
a: actual location - easy to pinpoint and map today
b. Traffic: Many cities are starting to make traffic cameras available, and mapping packages like Microsoft Bing have a real time capability to show major thoroughfare bottlenecks.
c. Weather: NOAA and other weather providers are identifying severe weather ahead of time, and making those alerts easily consumable.
d. Events: Where did that neighborhood parade come from?
These are just some of the simple sharing items that can occur - when you combine business partner interactions, government to private sector notifications, movement of data between government layers (federal, state, local), and all the other types of shareable data, there is much to choose from.
Standardized collection of all these data types and the distribution to a wide array of mobile devices will change the fabric of our lives in 20 years. Data will be available where needed (increasingly from automated sensors in a structured form) to make better decisions. It will impact us in every aspect of our lives - especially as video becomes smarter and provides data as well as images.
Will there be negative backlash - of course? Will there be breakdowns and shortfalls? Undoubtedly. Privacy violations? Many. Will the inexorable push forward continue? Absolutely - just like the glaciers in the Ice Age.
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
$3 Microscope plugs into Cell Phone!
Check this MIT Technology Review story out.
http://www.technologyreview.com/biomedicine/25286/?nlid=2973&a=f
The implications for standardized, interoperable plug-ins to cell phones and other portable devices are amazing - as long as the data moving from one device to the other is interoperable, you can assemble some amazing capture and use scenarios.....
This is in a similar vein to the glasses that can be adjusted by the user in the field rather than being done by perscription - you use a pump to change the pressure of some internal fluid which changes the shape of the lens to fit the user's eyesight.
Go interoperability.
http://www.technologyreview.com/biomedicine/25286/?nlid=2973&a=f
The implications for standardized, interoperable plug-ins to cell phones and other portable devices are amazing - as long as the data moving from one device to the other is interoperable, you can assemble some amazing capture and use scenarios.....
This is in a similar vein to the glasses that can be adjusted by the user in the field rather than being done by perscription - you use a pump to change the pressure of some internal fluid which changes the shape of the lens to fit the user's eyesight.
Go interoperability.
Saturday, April 24, 2010
Grim Reaper: Zero (0) --- Pete O'Dell: Still playing......
Wow, what a week. While I was lying the the intensive care unit and receving what seemed like the best medical care in the world for some blocked arterties that decided to seal up/give up/collapse on April 16th, the world of interoperability kicked in and helped give me a new extension on planet Earth:
The global network: I connected with people everywhere - more globally than in my own neighborhood (going to work on this). Response and outpouring of support was incredible.
AED: These little defibulators were the lifesaver - preventing any initial damage and restoring the heart rhythm. Highly recommneded for any place that has more than a few people, and I suggest that you get a training class on them.
Prevention: would have been best - some signs, but none of the major (pain, shortness of breadth, etc). I'd been working out a lot and at a pretty intense rate - you would have thought that I would have triggered a mild event sooner. Get checked.
Stents: The docs put in 3 stents to allow flow through the bad heart atteries - no need for open heart surgery or bypass, which I think I'm very grateful for....
More to follow as I figure this all out......I'll use the interoperability as a theme to tie it all together. Today, I'm thankful to be alive, thankful to all the people who made that happen, thankful for the extended opportunity to make a difference in the world. I'm hopeful that God has it all figured out for the next couple of weeks, as my brain is still a little mushy. Any thoughts appreciated.
The global network: I connected with people everywhere - more globally than in my own neighborhood (going to work on this). Response and outpouring of support was incredible.
AED: These little defibulators were the lifesaver - preventing any initial damage and restoring the heart rhythm. Highly recommneded for any place that has more than a few people, and I suggest that you get a training class on them.
Prevention: would have been best - some signs, but none of the major (pain, shortness of breadth, etc). I'd been working out a lot and at a pretty intense rate - you would have thought that I would have triggered a mild event sooner. Get checked.
Stents: The docs put in 3 stents to allow flow through the bad heart atteries - no need for open heart surgery or bypass, which I think I'm very grateful for....
More to follow as I figure this all out......I'll use the interoperability as a theme to tie it all together. Today, I'm thankful to be alive, thankful to all the people who made that happen, thankful for the extended opportunity to make a difference in the world. I'm hopeful that God has it all figured out for the next couple of weeks, as my brain is still a little mushy. Any thoughts appreciated.
Thursday, April 22, 2010
interoperable medicine
Just getting out a a 6 day stint in ICU - despite all good intentions, diet, working out, etc, I ended up with a genetic heart problem that laid me flat. If not for some very fast defibulation by somone who knew how to use a standard interoperable device, it might have been far worse!!! (no further blog entry type of worse).
Trying to figure out the implications later and the meaning now......powerful experience. Check for updates, and get out and get the best preventative care you can!!! Far better to avoid than try to clean up later - not much more important.
Trying to figure out the implications later and the meaning now......powerful experience. Check for updates, and get out and get the best preventative care you can!!! Far better to avoid than try to clean up later - not much more important.
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
NIEM a front for the CIA?
http://www.fiercegovernmentit.com/story/blumenthat-niem-not-cia-trojan-horse/2010-04-04
This article is unbelievable. The Health guy identified rumors that NIEM was a front for the CIA because the data could move easily between agencies, and disavowed/denied any knowledge. Why the CIA would be interested in the scans of Grandma's colon cancer is quite beyond me.
While it's true that interoperable railroads allowed the Nazis to invade Eastern Europe, the idea of keeping government data completely *#$#ed up as a hedge against invasive prying has got to be way up the list - maybe we couldy bury individual time capsules in the mall that can only be dug up by court order and citizen watchdogs could oversee (but THAT watchdog could be working for the CIA!).
What do do? Standardized data would be far easier to audit, control and meter among agencies. Lets join the 21st centrury.
http://www.fiercegovernmentit.com/story/blumenthat-niem-not-cia-trojan-horse/2010-04-04
This article is unbelievable. The Health guy identified rumors that NIEM was a front for the CIA because the data could move easily between agencies, and disavowed/denied any knowledge. Why the CIA would be interested in the scans of Grandma's colon cancer is quite beyond me.
While it's true that interoperable railroads allowed the Nazis to invade Eastern Europe, the idea of keeping government data completely *#$#ed up as a hedge against invasive prying has got to be way up the list - maybe we couldy bury individual time capsules in the mall that can only be dug up by court order and citizen watchdogs could oversee (but THAT watchdog could be working for the CIA!).
What do do? Standardized data would be far easier to audit, control and meter among agencies. Lets join the 21st centrury.
Saturday, April 3, 2010
Transparency Camp - Washington DC
I attended Transparency Camp in Washington DC last Saturday of March (it ran all weekend, but I had a prior engagement that I would have liked to skip to attend both days).
Over 200 people from all walks of life except Fortune 500 companies - non-profits, government, small business, citizens, local and state government.
The transparency drums are beating louder, and much has been accomplished over the last year since the inaugural camp. Of note, the Sunlight Foundation is leading on a lot of fronts - both from a policy positioning standpoint, and also harnessing many of the application developer community.
I talked to a number of people about my position on interoperable data - that the government needs to work on giving the data in real time and in a free, forward leaning (XML) format. The National Information Exchange Model group in DHS/DOJ has been moving this ball forward in government, and OASIS is one of the premiere organizations driving worldwide.
Common Alerting Protocol is key for real time alerting - its flexible, multi-lingual, geospatially capable, and adaptableto many situations. There are a number of other great standards coming behind it. CAP is used by NOAA, FCC, FEMA, many commercial vendors, and a host of other groups around the world - including Sri Lanka. CAP supports many types of warning devices - from computers to sirens to emergency activated radios.
Congrats to all who made Transparency Camp happen. With all the whining, gnashing of teeth, partisan positioning, it was great to see a group of people working to make something happen!!!!!
Over 200 people from all walks of life except Fortune 500 companies - non-profits, government, small business, citizens, local and state government.
The transparency drums are beating louder, and much has been accomplished over the last year since the inaugural camp. Of note, the Sunlight Foundation is leading on a lot of fronts - both from a policy positioning standpoint, and also harnessing many of the application developer community.
I talked to a number of people about my position on interoperable data - that the government needs to work on giving the data in real time and in a free, forward leaning (XML) format. The National Information Exchange Model group in DHS/DOJ has been moving this ball forward in government, and OASIS is one of the premiere organizations driving worldwide.
Common Alerting Protocol is key for real time alerting - its flexible, multi-lingual, geospatially capable, and adaptableto many situations. There are a number of other great standards coming behind it. CAP is used by NOAA, FCC, FEMA, many commercial vendors, and a host of other groups around the world - including Sri Lanka. CAP supports many types of warning devices - from computers to sirens to emergency activated radios.
Congrats to all who made Transparency Camp happen. With all the whining, gnashing of teeth, partisan positioning, it was great to see a group of people working to make something happen!!!!!
Friday, March 26, 2010
National ID Cards
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Interoperabe loyalty - why not?
If you are like most people, you have a number of cards in your wallet or purse - all for the purpose of identifying yourself to a merchant and receiving points, discounts, and other things. My wallet is twice as thick as it needs to be, and my girlfriend has at least twice as many cards.....
Why doesn't an entrepeneur create a smart loyalty card or APP that allows people to have one card with all the numbers, identifiers, points totals, etc all in one place? This would be great for consumers, and likely save the merchant a ton of money overall in terms of processing them. As they developed, offers could be loaded into this entity instead of into my work email.
This could be a powerful idea!
Why doesn't an entrepeneur create a smart loyalty card or APP that allows people to have one card with all the numbers, identifiers, points totals, etc all in one place? This would be great for consumers, and likely save the merchant a ton of money overall in terms of processing them. As they developed, offers could be loaded into this entity instead of into my work email.
This could be a powerful idea!
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Battery technology
www.autonews.com/article/20100316/VIDEO/303169968/1219
Great video on common battery charging technology - Japan aiming at global standard!
Great video on common battery charging technology - Japan aiming at global standard!
Monday, March 15, 2010
Interoperable Rant.....SUNPASS
One of best government sharing programs is EZ-PASS - throughout almost all East Coast States, paying tolls on the highway is a breeze no matter where you are. You zip through all the toll booths, and the EZ-Pass system takes care of you pretty well in my experience.
Not so in Florida - their "SunPass" is completely incompatible with everything apparently, so I spent the week spending an extra 5 minutes or much more bottled up in a side lane paying manually. No interface to anything.
Come on Florida, get with the 21st Century!
Not so in Florida - their "SunPass" is completely incompatible with everything apparently, so I spent the week spending an extra 5 minutes or much more bottled up in a side lane paying manually. No interface to anything.
Come on Florida, get with the 21st Century!
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
Next Generation 9-1-1 - anybody seen it?
DOT has been "working" on a Next Generation 9-1-1 for years, with little apparent success or results. If you Google "next generation 911" nothing from DOT is visible. If you go to Google news, nothing from the Federal Government shows up?
I'm going to drill into this - I tried to get involved several years ago, and was basically told that "we have our best people working on it, no need for you to get involved". I was also told that project trials were "on the way" and imminent.
If you don't understand the gravity of the problem, you can only call 9-1-1 on the phone, and even then, if you are using a mobile phone, they might not know where you are. Too many calls to operators at any one call center can overwhelm them, rendering 9-1-1 useless for a period of time while they are cleared. 9-1-1 has no interaction in most cases with 3-1-1 and other community hotlines - causing further confusion.
You can't text 9-1-1, you can't email 9-1-1, and you sure can't twitter 9-1-1 if you see an accident with injuries right in front of your eyes. You also can't be notified digitally if there is a cloud of noxious, poison gas 2 miles down the road - almost all 9-1-1s do not publish their calls for service digitally to either trusted constituents who have been vetted, or to the public.
Houston is one notable exception - their 9-1-1 feed is available to all the community vendors out there. Excellent work on their part, and it should be incorporated into all PSAPs (public service answering points).
Much more to follow, I'm going to make it my part time passion to get some answers on this one.....
I'm going to drill into this - I tried to get involved several years ago, and was basically told that "we have our best people working on it, no need for you to get involved". I was also told that project trials were "on the way" and imminent.
If you don't understand the gravity of the problem, you can only call 9-1-1 on the phone, and even then, if you are using a mobile phone, they might not know where you are. Too many calls to operators at any one call center can overwhelm them, rendering 9-1-1 useless for a period of time while they are cleared. 9-1-1 has no interaction in most cases with 3-1-1 and other community hotlines - causing further confusion.
You can't text 9-1-1, you can't email 9-1-1, and you sure can't twitter 9-1-1 if you see an accident with injuries right in front of your eyes. You also can't be notified digitally if there is a cloud of noxious, poison gas 2 miles down the road - almost all 9-1-1s do not publish their calls for service digitally to either trusted constituents who have been vetted, or to the public.
Houston is one notable exception - their 9-1-1 feed is available to all the community vendors out there. Excellent work on their part, and it should be incorporated into all PSAPs (public service answering points).
Much more to follow, I'm going to make it my part time passion to get some answers on this one.....
Monday, February 22, 2010
One part of government that is working....NIEM
You see a lot of gridlock in government today - health care, spending, partisan bickering, Not very conducive to making anything happen. I won't even start to talk about all the dumb projects that seem to consume dollars but produce no results...but here is a great example of something that is working very well:
I attended a National Information Exchange Model Town Hall last week and the theme was the desire to advance their cause and make the movement of data between governemnt agencies easy at the "plumbing" level. They wanted feedback so they could align their strategic planning session with what was needed by their supporters.
The event harnessed people from all corners - government, commercial, contractors, NGO and many others. There was some good information presented, but the overwhelming amount of time went toward gathering feedback on how NIEM could be more successful, address a greater audience, and gather information on when it is successful.
This has been an organization that has put some very good things in place that will work across government - and is a true collaboration of agencies - DHS and DOJ taking the lead, but many others particpating.
This effort has enormous impacts for saving lives and property, decreasing the friction between agencies when transfering data, and helping transparency efforts in terms of making the data usable once it is accessible.
There were certainly different points of view on what the mission should be, and how the mission should be explained to non-technical participants and would be supporters like Congress, but it was a high energy, well constructed 4 hours. Kudos.
I attended a National Information Exchange Model Town Hall last week and the theme was the desire to advance their cause and make the movement of data between governemnt agencies easy at the "plumbing" level. They wanted feedback so they could align their strategic planning session with what was needed by their supporters.
The event harnessed people from all corners - government, commercial, contractors, NGO and many others. There was some good information presented, but the overwhelming amount of time went toward gathering feedback on how NIEM could be more successful, address a greater audience, and gather information on when it is successful.
This has been an organization that has put some very good things in place that will work across government - and is a true collaboration of agencies - DHS and DOJ taking the lead, but many others particpating.
This effort has enormous impacts for saving lives and property, decreasing the friction between agencies when transfering data, and helping transparency efforts in terms of making the data usable once it is accessible.
There were certainly different points of view on what the mission should be, and how the mission should be explained to non-technical participants and would be supporters like Congress, but it was a high energy, well constructed 4 hours. Kudos.
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Universal interoperability - one example
The world is a tough place filled with disconnected, non-interoperable elements.
One standard that works great everywhere I've been is "Thank you", part of XGL (XML Gratitude Language). When expressed sincerely in a bi-directional or even uni-directional manner, it inspires people, makes them glad you showed up, makes you glad you showed up, and generallly improves things greatly!
I'm leaving Australia after 3 intense, action packed work weeks and a little fun. A big "Thank You" to the whole country for a delightful experience.
One standard that works great everywhere I've been is "Thank you", part of XGL (XML Gratitude Language). When expressed sincerely in a bi-directional or even uni-directional manner, it inspires people, makes them glad you showed up, makes you glad you showed up, and generallly improves things greatly!
I'm leaving Australia after 3 intense, action packed work weeks and a little fun. A big "Thank You" to the whole country for a delightful experience.
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
Interoperable language.....
If you are reading this, you speak English, right?
What version of English, and is it interopeable.....having spent the last 2.5 weeks in Australia, you might be suprised how many different words there are that are different, or some of the same words that in fact mean different things.
"2/5 of bugger off" is my favorite so far - it translates to basically "nuttin" in Brooklyn, or "you're unlikely to realize any upside" in Silicon Valley.
Plenty of other examples that I'm compiling.....anyone else run into this problem in other English speaking countries?
What version of English, and is it interopeable.....having spent the last 2.5 weeks in Australia, you might be suprised how many different words there are that are different, or some of the same words that in fact mean different things.
"2/5 of bugger off" is my favorite so far - it translates to basically "nuttin" in Brooklyn, or "you're unlikely to realize any upside" in Silicon Valley.
Plenty of other examples that I'm compiling.....anyone else run into this problem in other English speaking countries?
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Good article
http://newsmax.com/Headline/obama-weapons-mass-destruction/2010/01/26/id/348085
Obama administration earns an F from WMD panel. Interoperable data would help this once you get over the turf issues. When will we learn to share?
http://newsmax.com/Headline/obama-weapons-mass-destruction/2010/01/26/id/348085
Obama administration earns an F from WMD panel. Interoperable data would help this once you get over the turf issues. When will we learn to share?
Sunday, January 24, 2010
Interoperable travel (and not)
I’m in the air on the way to Melbourne, Australia to do 3 weeks of work on a variety of things. I thought it would be interesting to note the standards that delighted, or were used or abused along the way:
Good things:
1. English: It’s nice to have a standardized communications interface all along, and comforting for me to know that all the pilots have standardized on English as their standard command language. I enjoy going to other cultures and trying different languages for pleasure, but work is much easier without translation.
2. Internet: a glimpse into the future of global standards – its all the same and familiar no matter where I am for the next 3 weeks. Could run into a modem if I get to the outback, but unlikely.
3. Commerce: Got VISA? No problem. Need cash? ATMs abound. Sure beats letters of credit, money belts and travelers checks of yesteryear. Score one for interoperable, cross organization data and security.
4. Government: Seems like a pretty standardized disregard/disdain of government everyplace I landed, though it’s pretty remarkable how well we seem to have figured out a lot of things in terms of governance, visas, and the like. I’m not going to comment on security.
5. Airline reservation system: Built in the 60’s and improved ever since – pretty amazing when you start to think about all the moving parts that it encompasses.
Frustrating or suboptimal:
1. Left side driving – no renting a car in Australia – I’m not comfortable driving on the other side of the road – what if we all went one way or the other worldwide – what would cumulative impact on manufacturing, travel, etc be?
2. Plugs: My adapter is at the ready for Australia, and can interface me to about 9 other countries as well. Too bad we don’t have a globalized standard – though you can understand that it grew up separately.
3. That pesky metric system: This is “our bad” in the US. I remember in 5th grade we were going to convert, and we bailed apparently – likely that last generation of lobbyists.
4. Cell phone: I’ve gone from unlimited usage to $1.69 a minute while I’m down under. Hello, Skype.
5. Wireless roaming – sheesh, you think there would be transparency and some simple way to do this without yanking out your credit card every time – like telling TMobile to make it happen as long as it doesn’t cost more than $5/hour for short term access.
Good things:
1. English: It’s nice to have a standardized communications interface all along, and comforting for me to know that all the pilots have standardized on English as their standard command language. I enjoy going to other cultures and trying different languages for pleasure, but work is much easier without translation.
2. Internet: a glimpse into the future of global standards – its all the same and familiar no matter where I am for the next 3 weeks. Could run into a modem if I get to the outback, but unlikely.
3. Commerce: Got VISA? No problem. Need cash? ATMs abound. Sure beats letters of credit, money belts and travelers checks of yesteryear. Score one for interoperable, cross organization data and security.
4. Government: Seems like a pretty standardized disregard/disdain of government everyplace I landed, though it’s pretty remarkable how well we seem to have figured out a lot of things in terms of governance, visas, and the like. I’m not going to comment on security.
5. Airline reservation system: Built in the 60’s and improved ever since – pretty amazing when you start to think about all the moving parts that it encompasses.
Frustrating or suboptimal:
1. Left side driving – no renting a car in Australia – I’m not comfortable driving on the other side of the road – what if we all went one way or the other worldwide – what would cumulative impact on manufacturing, travel, etc be?
2. Plugs: My adapter is at the ready for Australia, and can interface me to about 9 other countries as well. Too bad we don’t have a globalized standard – though you can understand that it grew up separately.
3. That pesky metric system: This is “our bad” in the US. I remember in 5th grade we were going to convert, and we bailed apparently – likely that last generation of lobbyists.
4. Cell phone: I’ve gone from unlimited usage to $1.69 a minute while I’m down under. Hello, Skype.
5. Wireless roaming – sheesh, you think there would be transparency and some simple way to do this without yanking out your credit card every time – like telling TMobile to make it happen as long as it doesn’t cost more than $5/hour for short term access.
Friday, January 22, 2010
NGO Interoperability with governments
The feedback I'm getting on Haiti is that everyone is working their heart out trying to make things happen, save lives, treat the wounded, and keep some stability going.
The feedback that I'm also getting is that information sharing between all the various agencies is very difficult, hamstrings the effective deployment of resources and generally diminishes all the heroic efforts.
I recommend that the NGO leadership across a wide range organizations take the reins of this problem, work with or adopt some of the best principles of OASIS and NIEM.gov, and continue to build a set of interoperable, XML based transactions that can be shared in an emergency. CAP (Common Alerting Protocol), HAVE (hospital Availability) and RM (resource messaging) are great starting points and ready to go after a lot of hard work and testing by the groups developing these.
These are free to the world, and their adopted use will encourage/force system vendors to adopt and expand their use dramatically.
If everyone shoots the same interoperable information "bullets" we'll get some great economies of scale, very good sharing, and the ability to build on this layer with predictive analytics, credential management, volunteer and skills manifests that can all be shared across the organizations in a disaster/incident.
There is going to be a major virtual exercise in August that is open for worldwide participation, email me at peterlodell@gmail.com for details.
The feedback that I'm also getting is that information sharing between all the various agencies is very difficult, hamstrings the effective deployment of resources and generally diminishes all the heroic efforts.
I recommend that the NGO leadership across a wide range organizations take the reins of this problem, work with or adopt some of the best principles of OASIS and NIEM.gov, and continue to build a set of interoperable, XML based transactions that can be shared in an emergency. CAP (Common Alerting Protocol), HAVE (hospital Availability) and RM (resource messaging) are great starting points and ready to go after a lot of hard work and testing by the groups developing these.
These are free to the world, and their adopted use will encourage/force system vendors to adopt and expand their use dramatically.
If everyone shoots the same interoperable information "bullets" we'll get some great economies of scale, very good sharing, and the ability to build on this layer with predictive analytics, credential management, volunteer and skills manifests that can all be shared across the organizations in a disaster/incident.
There is going to be a major virtual exercise in August that is open for worldwide participation, email me at peterlodell@gmail.com for details.
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
What will we learn in Haiti??? The same thing!
Its early in this tragic disaster, but we've already seen how effective off the shelf social media tools have been in establishing communications and getting the adhoc word out. Regular people were skyping, tweeting, and sending pictures through regular old email.
What we'll also likely see is that the relief organizations can't talk to one another's emergency relief systems, that the military will not communicate will with all the NGOS, and that the internal Hatian based systems will be interoperable with all......
We need a strong implementation effort on intereoperable data like Common Alerting Protocol and other emergency management formats under development. Another example of not being able to connect the dots when lives are at risk.
What we'll also likely see is that the relief organizations can't talk to one another's emergency relief systems, that the military will not communicate will with all the NGOS, and that the internal Hatian based systems will be interoperable with all......
We need a strong implementation effort on intereoperable data like Common Alerting Protocol and other emergency management formats under development. Another example of not being able to connect the dots when lives are at risk.
Monday, January 11, 2010
Fix the plumbing to connect the dots.....
President Obama said about the intelligence failures surrounding the underwear bomber incident, “There are no silver bullets.” And he’s right: there is no single magic step we can take to catch every terrorist. That does not mean, however, that we can’t improve intelligence sharing significantly, and immediately.
A pundit on NPR asked recently why in this age of information a bank can let the credit card company know immediately if he’s missed his monthly payment –yet our counter-terrorism systems still fail to alert airport officials about a potentially dangerous terrorist bomber?
A cynic might answer, because credit card systems were not built on government contracts. But the real problem lies deeper.
Richard Clarke, the security advisor to both the Clinton and Bush administrations who famously predicted an Al Qaeda attack before 9/11, said during a recent TV interview that he was “shocked” the U.S. intelligence community still doesn’t have software that can connect the dots in simple cases like one-way cash ticket/no luggage/worried father/known connections to terrorism. Clarke made the same point at a Portland town hall meeting in 2002, attended by over 600 people. Information sharing is a key line defense against terrorism, he said then, and we’ve got to get it right. Eight years and tens of billions of dollars later, he’s still saying the same thing.
After working on this issue professionally as a software architect in and around government information sharing programs for most of these same eight years, here’s what I’ve learned: Below the interagency cultural and turf issues – and there are many—our intelligence community has a serious plumbing problem. Its information pipes are old, disconnected and full of, well, let’s call it solid waste. And all we seem to be doing is building more of the same old, dysfunctional pipes.
What we need is a whole new model—one which “virtualizes” all the old plumbing, and essentially routes around it. Without getting too technical, the key to doing this is to launch new “green field” systems that are fast, nimble, highly connected and focused on interoperable data models, instead of siloed databases and applications.
Technically speaking, the systemic failure to connect dots into meaningful, actionable threat pictures is a data interoperability problem—a problem that governments have faced, and solved, before. In World War 1, there was no ammunition interoperability among the French, English and US forces –each army had its own unique guns and bullets. In an integrated field of battle, this led to many problems. These same armies eventually standardized on a 7.62mm caliber bullet, which meant that the guns of all the allied armies could start using the same ammo. Huge economies of scale and tactical efficiencies resulted.
Today, each intelligence agency in our government has its own, non-standard “data bullets.” No wonder they are still quite capable of shooting blanks, even in relatively obvious cases. The lack of standardization is keeping intelligence collection dots separated—and all the rest of us are paying with dollars and lives at risk.
A small group inside of the government called the National Information Exchange Model (www.NIEM.gov) is working from the bottom up to develop new kind of data interoperability, and make it viable across not just intelligence agencies, but across all levels and branches of government. But NIEM is small, underfunded effort relative to the size of the problem.
In the past “decade of disasters,” as it’s been dubbed , billions have been spent on government systems that either haven’t worked or have been incompatible with others. We’ve witnessed this problem first hand on 9/11, during the Katrina Hurricane, and recently with both the Fort Hood shooter and underwear bomber. We have also seen over and over that one law enforcement agency doesn’t have information about a killer on parole from another jurisdiction – the recent Seattle shootings were a tragic example. How many more debacles and disasters is it going to take?
In an age when teens from around the world can find each other in real time to play the same obscure video game, the fact we don’t have more interconnected intelligence systems is a national scandal. We need to automate our information collection, analyzing and processing systems with the relentlessness of a WalMart – driving toward a standardized, comprehensible system that can work in both classified arenas, between first resonders and in the public domain.
New systems with standardized, fully interoperable data models are needed instantly—and must become widely available, not just buried in beltway bunkers. Certainly, secret intelligent systems are needed. But these must also interoperate with open systems (with appropriate cyber protections) to deliver critical information to front line personnel who don’t have security clearances, but who are tasked with acting, and interfacing to the public.
There is also every reason to engage the public in this effort using the tools that they are using every day – cell phones, cameras, email, Twitter, Facebook and other real time communication tools. How many passengers on the Christmas Eve flight might have noticed the purported terrorist behaving strangely, and reported their suspicions had there been a way? After the fact reports tell us he was extremely nervous and had a “thousand yard stare.”
Protecting the public is the public’s business, and we should engage everyone who can make a difference. The cost of many new innovative “open source” intelligence services is probably less than a few new body scanners—but the payoffs of any aroused watchful public could be immense.
A pundit on NPR asked recently why in this age of information a bank can let the credit card company know immediately if he’s missed his monthly payment –yet our counter-terrorism systems still fail to alert airport officials about a potentially dangerous terrorist bomber?
A cynic might answer, because credit card systems were not built on government contracts. But the real problem lies deeper.
Richard Clarke, the security advisor to both the Clinton and Bush administrations who famously predicted an Al Qaeda attack before 9/11, said during a recent TV interview that he was “shocked” the U.S. intelligence community still doesn’t have software that can connect the dots in simple cases like one-way cash ticket/no luggage/worried father/known connections to terrorism. Clarke made the same point at a Portland town hall meeting in 2002, attended by over 600 people. Information sharing is a key line defense against terrorism, he said then, and we’ve got to get it right. Eight years and tens of billions of dollars later, he’s still saying the same thing.
After working on this issue professionally as a software architect in and around government information sharing programs for most of these same eight years, here’s what I’ve learned: Below the interagency cultural and turf issues – and there are many—our intelligence community has a serious plumbing problem. Its information pipes are old, disconnected and full of, well, let’s call it solid waste. And all we seem to be doing is building more of the same old, dysfunctional pipes.
What we need is a whole new model—one which “virtualizes” all the old plumbing, and essentially routes around it. Without getting too technical, the key to doing this is to launch new “green field” systems that are fast, nimble, highly connected and focused on interoperable data models, instead of siloed databases and applications.
Technically speaking, the systemic failure to connect dots into meaningful, actionable threat pictures is a data interoperability problem—a problem that governments have faced, and solved, before. In World War 1, there was no ammunition interoperability among the French, English and US forces –each army had its own unique guns and bullets. In an integrated field of battle, this led to many problems. These same armies eventually standardized on a 7.62mm caliber bullet, which meant that the guns of all the allied armies could start using the same ammo. Huge economies of scale and tactical efficiencies resulted.
Today, each intelligence agency in our government has its own, non-standard “data bullets.” No wonder they are still quite capable of shooting blanks, even in relatively obvious cases. The lack of standardization is keeping intelligence collection dots separated—and all the rest of us are paying with dollars and lives at risk.
A small group inside of the government called the National Information Exchange Model (www.NIEM.gov) is working from the bottom up to develop new kind of data interoperability, and make it viable across not just intelligence agencies, but across all levels and branches of government. But NIEM is small, underfunded effort relative to the size of the problem.
In the past “decade of disasters,” as it’s been dubbed , billions have been spent on government systems that either haven’t worked or have been incompatible with others. We’ve witnessed this problem first hand on 9/11, during the Katrina Hurricane, and recently with both the Fort Hood shooter and underwear bomber. We have also seen over and over that one law enforcement agency doesn’t have information about a killer on parole from another jurisdiction – the recent Seattle shootings were a tragic example. How many more debacles and disasters is it going to take?
In an age when teens from around the world can find each other in real time to play the same obscure video game, the fact we don’t have more interconnected intelligence systems is a national scandal. We need to automate our information collection, analyzing and processing systems with the relentlessness of a WalMart – driving toward a standardized, comprehensible system that can work in both classified arenas, between first resonders and in the public domain.
New systems with standardized, fully interoperable data models are needed instantly—and must become widely available, not just buried in beltway bunkers. Certainly, secret intelligent systems are needed. But these must also interoperate with open systems (with appropriate cyber protections) to deliver critical information to front line personnel who don’t have security clearances, but who are tasked with acting, and interfacing to the public.
There is also every reason to engage the public in this effort using the tools that they are using every day – cell phones, cameras, email, Twitter, Facebook and other real time communication tools. How many passengers on the Christmas Eve flight might have noticed the purported terrorist behaving strangely, and reported their suspicions had there been a way? After the fact reports tell us he was extremely nervous and had a “thousand yard stare.”
Protecting the public is the public’s business, and we should engage everyone who can make a difference. The cost of many new innovative “open source” intelligence services is probably less than a few new body scanners—but the payoffs of any aroused watchful public could be immense.
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