Open data in terms of digitalization

Abstract

This article reviews the annual open data barometer rating in the next edition of the global report in 115 countries and jurisdictions. It focuses on the popularization of open data in the world and the Russian Federation, its state of development, its prospects, and emerging problems. Issues related to legal regulation of open data, including criminal data in modern conditions of digitalization, are discussed.

Full Text

New digital technologies help to increase the speed of decision-making, while reducing the time for both thinking and discussion, and the time between making a decision and its social impact. The number of sources for variegated information by citizens, alternative to government sources, is increasing. In these conditions, the advantage goes to the one who forms the information picture faster.

In many countries, open public administration is based on data disclosure initiatives that allow for transparency in the activities of various government agencies by creating databases and new services for citizens, organizations, and other groups.

The World Wide Web Foundation has published the annual Open Data Barometer in the next edition of the Global Report [1]. It provides statistics on how governments in different countries publish and use open data for accountability, innovation, and social impact. Thus, the Open Data Barometer of this edition covers 115 countries and jurisdictions, which is 25% more than in previous editions, and evaluates data provided by world governments from 15 data sectors [1].

This edition of the Global Report evaluates 1,725 data sets, including health sector indicators, primary and secondary education performance data, crime statistics, national environmental statistics, national election results, and others. At the same time, Russia has open data on all existing sectors.

The topic of open data is becoming increasingly popular both around the world and in the Russian Federation. Open data is at the heart of a global movement that can bring significant social and economic benefits to humanity. By developing and adopting common principles in support of open data, governments can work to create more just and prosperous societies.

In the global ranking, Russia, previously consistently ranked 25th out of 115, rose by 13 [1].

Research results show that a significant amount of government data is not available to a wide audience and is rarely published in an open format. Moreover, even data that is open is not able to meet the needs of all citizens. It should be noted that in various countries, the negative consequences for the authorities from hiding information are often comparable to the costs of eliminating these consequences. Thus, it becomes more profitable for the authorities to increase their own openness and efficiency in providing information.

In 2016, the data set on crime in Russia was already 95% open. Now the information is easy to find on the internet. It is free, regularly updated and available in large volumes. At the same time, only 20% of crime data sets are loaded in such volumes.

Given the scale of the introduction of public services in digital terms, the expansion of access to official information databases and the development of the market for automating the provision of various services in Russia, open data is of particular importance.

Article 29 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation guarantees the right of everyone to freely seek, receive, transmit, produce, and disseminate information in any legal way.

To implement the strategy for the development of the information society in the Russian Federation [2], President Vladimir Putin, by his decree, defined the ways to improve the system of public administration and their achievement. The involved the openness of the public administration system and the availability and quality of public services, as well as the need to involve citizens in the discussion, adoption, and control of the implementation of state decisions [5].

To execute this decree, the Government of the Russian Federation in January 2014 approved the Concept of Openness of Federal Executive Bodies [6].

Article 8 of Russian Federal Law “On Information, Information Technologies and Information Protection,” gives citizens and organizations the right to search for and receive any information in any form and from any source, subject to compliance with the requirements established by federal law. In addition, a citizen is entitled to receive information directly affecting his rights and freedoms from state bodies, local self-government bodies, and their officials [7].

As part of the implementation of the Decree of the President of the Russian Federation “On the Main Directions of Improving the Public Administration System,” state bodies and local self-government bodies publish information about their activities on the internet in the form of open data [5].

The procedure for obtaining such information is regulated by Federal Laws “On the Procedure for Reporting on the Activities of State Authorities in State Mass Media,” [8] and “On Ensuring Access to Information on the Activities of State Bodies and Local Self-Government Bodies,” which oblige all state structures to provide timely and reliable information about their activities, including through the use of mass media and the internet [9].

In Russia, the main role in the legal regulation of open data is performed by the Open Government. Thus, the website of the Open Government of the Russian Federation notes that open data is the foundation upon which the entire Open Government system should be built [10].

In the first three years of the Open Government Institute's existence alone, more than 5,000 open data sets have already been published (more than 3,000 of them on the portal http://data.gov.ru/), on the basis of which one can create internet applications designed to improve the life quality of ordinary people and help in making management decisions (in 2017, there are already more than 12,000 data sets). Among the implemented ones, it is worth noting the application for travelers in Russia, called “TopTripTip,” the transport applications “ETransport” and “Yandex.Transport,” solutions for the monitoring of contractors, "Kommersant Kartoteka,” and a data aggregator about cities, “Gradoteka” [10].

The Analytical Center under the Government of the Russian Federation developed the All-Russia open data portal, which was launched in March 2014. This portal is open for public access at http://data.gov.ru.

The internet currently hosts open data on various topics, from the budget of the Russian Federation and the income of deputies to real-time traffic and geodata. For example, the website “Open Databases of the Russian Federation” presents more than 100 different sites with statistical data, including criminal ones [11].

At the same time, the lack of compatibility of various automated systems complicates the processing of information and, accordingly, leads to additional manual labor associated with the control and removal of duplicate data. Only the development of an open data infrastructure will eliminate these problems in automation systems at various levels.

Incompatibility of data and regulations lead to a loss of public confidence in the authorities.

This and other problems, as well as their causes, are discussed in works by Styrin E.M. [12], Vetrova E.N. [13], Trofimova E.V. [14], Bochilo I.L. [15], Kolesov M.V. [16], and others.

In addition, an important problem is the promotion of an environment of trust in society. Therefore, one of the directions of digital transformation is the creation of such an environment, including by the prosecutor's office, to ensure technical, organizational, and legal protection of the interests of citizens, the state, and entrepreneurs. For this purpose, an interactive crime map of the Russian Federation has been created, for the interaction of citizens with the judicial and legislative authorities organized through e-government channels.

Given that the Research Institute of the University Prosecutor of the Russian Federation is the legal successor of the All-Union Institute for developing methods of crime prevention, it is important to note that questions of creation and introduction in the practice of work of bodies of prosecutor’s office of automated information systems were investigated by the employees of al-Union Institute: Andreev B.V., Bykov L.A., Vaganov E.A., Vorontsov M.A., Gurkina E.M., Emel’yanova L.V., Zvyagina L.M., Karakhanian A.K., Korf N.N., Malinin V.G., Pankratov V.V., Panteleev P.A., Soya-Serko L.A., Tulyakov A.A., Schrage I.L., and Eisman A.A. [17].

Also, works by employees of the Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation and the University of the Prosecutor's Office of the Russian Federation, including Insarov O.A., Nekrasov A.Yu., Suvorov A.E., Kosova N.V., Kapinus O.S., Budai S.N., and many others are devoted to the issues of digitalization of prosecutor's activities.

One of the key elements of the trust environment is open data on the results of activities by the Prosecutor's Office of the Russian Federation, which contain basic statistics on the state of crime in Russia, and measures taken to combat corruption. The official websites of the prosecutor's office also cover issues of international cooperation and interaction with the media, legal education, and information on the use of allocated budget funds.

However, the level of data openness is not high enough.

According to I. V. Begtin, the main reason for this condition of state body openness is the low level of information culture among employees from a significant portion of Russian state institutions, and the lack of regulations regarding the collection, processing, and updating of materials created by them. Officials attempt to refuse the disclosure of data, citing its poor quality. But the disclosure of information can improve this quality [18].

Another issue with open data is that it needs to be not only compatible, transparent, but also reliable.

To ensure the reliability of data pertaining to criminal and legal statistics in accordance with Article 51 of Federal Law “On the procuracy of the Russian Federation” [19] since January 2012, the public prosecution bodies of the Russian Federation are vested with the conduct of public unified statistical accounting of statements and messages on crimes, crime conditions, crime solving, and status and results of investigative work. As part of their implementation, the State Automated System of Legal Statistics (SAS LS), which is a single centralized system for collecting, processing, and storing these data, has been created and is being tested. One of its components is the public portal of legal statistics (crimestat.ru), which aims to ensure that citizens and the public are informed about the state of crime. Since August 2013, the portal has been carrying out activities to open criminal statistics data.

On the public portal (crimestat.ru) at the website of the Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation in the internet system, the following materials are published every month: “Crime in Russia,” 113 indicators from the book “Data on the State of Crime, Investigation, Prosecutor’s Supervision,” as well as a report on the form of Federal Statistical Observation No. 4-EGS “Information About the State of Crime and the Investigation of Crimes.”

Since 2016, eight sections of this report have been published. Starting from January 2018 on the portal “crimestat.ru,” one can acquainted oneself with all twelve of its sections, including three new ones, which contain information about crimes committed in the field of computer information or the use of information and telecommunications technologies related to the laundering of money or other property, and crimes of small and medium gravity, the preliminary investigation of which are conducted in the form of an inquiry.

More than 500,000 total indicators have been posted since January 2019 as Federal Statistical Observation No. 4-USS, including some 150,000 in its three new sections.

In addition, pursuant to the requirements of the decree by the Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation from 17.05.2018 No. 296, “About the Interaction of Bodies of the prosecutor’s Office with Mass Media and the Public,” the prosecutor of subjects of the Russian Federation regularly appears in the media with the latest reports on the state of crime. They regularly publicize the results of their work of the prosecutor’s office to ensure the reliability of criminal and legal statistics, related information about detected violations in this sphere, and measures taken for their elimination.

Most of the prosecutor's offices of the constituent entities of the Russian Federation have adopted the recommendations of the Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation [20] and established closer cooperation with the media.

The Statistics Section at the official website of the prosecutor’s office of the Kostroma region is supplemented with information on the state of crime in the region, updated monthly. It contains a direct link to the public portal of legal statistics from the Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation in the Information and Telecommunications Network “Internet” at www.crimestat.ru.

A new version of the official representation of the prosecutor’s office at the Lipetsk region on the internet has been developed, consisting of public and private sections. Since June 2018, an additional information banner, known as “legal statistics,” has been created.

A significant increase in the number of published criminal statistics certainly contributes to the improvement of Russia's position in the world ranking of openness of these data and the growth of public confidence in the authorities.

Currently, the tasks of data integration and sharing are being solved. Based on the development of SAS LS, the prosecution of legally significant electronic document management has been integrated with interdepartmental electronic document management of the interagency digital platform, for cooperation between prosecutors and heads of government bodies at all levels.

At the request of the Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation, integration services with external systems were developed through a single system of interdepartmental electronic interaction and dedicated communication channels, and work was carried out to modify them.

Access has been facilitated between several information systems of other state bodies —the State Information System of Housing and Public Utilities (SIS HPU), E-budget, Unified Interdepartmental Statistic Information System of Rosstat (UISI) — and the service environment, including the system of interdepartmental electronic interaction and resources of the FSO of Russia. Work is underway to organize access to the information resources of the Accounts Chamber of the Russian Federation, as well as services for citizens that will allow appointment scheduling and the submission of applications using the Unified Portal of Public Services. Also planned is the integration of the Federal State Information System Unified Register of Inspections (FSIS URI) with the State Automated System “Management” [21].

The use of new information technologies, such as big data (processing a large amount of data) or block chain (a database stored on many computers), is essential for the organization of activities conducted by the prosecutor's office and the formation of uniform requirements for all its components, ensuring the manageability of the prosecutor's system [22].

Currently in the Russian Federation, due to the active introduction of public services in electronic form and the increased access to various official information segments, open data is becoming ever more integral.