Our Open Data project explores issues connected to the quality of open data and the growing trend of public authorities openly sharing sets of preprocessed data. In relation to quality, the project investigates the paradox that since metrics of quality tend to be user-relative, the very openness of open dataset often makes it difficulty to judge their quality. This is because they are aimed at no specific user, making it difficulty to decide on markers of quality.
One potential solution we explore is to enhance quality by publishing open data in linkable form using Semantic Web techniques. In relation to sharing of data sets by public authorities, our project has focused in particular on the case studies of data.gov and data.gov.uk, where governments have made datasets related to e.g. crime and criminal justice public in an attempt to promote trust, transparency, and availability of information. We investigate the procedures by which public data sets are preprocessed to avoid sensitive information being inappropriately shared, and evaluate the efficiency of these procedures and whether they successfully serve their purpose.
