Data for Development: What’s Next? Concepts, Trends and Recommendations for German Development Cooperation

Ninety per cent of all data ever created has been produced in the past two years. This includes data generated by people as well as the billions of sensors all over the world that are creating data every second and communicating with servers over the internet, creating what is called the Internet of Things. Enabled by the rapid spread of technology and a more affordable access to the internet and mobile networks, the availability of digital data, in new and different forms, has grown at massive scale. Several initiatives have been launched in recent years that have explored diverse ways to leverage these new types of digital data for more targeted, effective and efficient development interventions. In this report, we look at the state of digital data for development and emerging trends. We aim to support German development cooperation in integrating and prioritising data approaches and investments in their work. In this study we focus on four data categories: big data, open data, citizen-generated data and real-time data. The selection of these categories considered two key dimensions: (1) the growing use in development-related policy discussions, and (2) the ability to capture key characteristics of interest, including size, access, source, and timeliness of data. We believe these categories provide a good starting point to explore how digital data production and use might lead to better development outcomes

The State of Open Data

It’s been ten years since open data first broke onto the global stage. Over the past decade, thousands of programmes and projects around the world have worked to open data and use it to address a myriad of social and economic challenges. Meanwhile, issues related to data rights and privacy have moved to the centre of public and political discourse. As the open data movement enters a new phase in its evolution, shifting to target real-world problems and embed open data thinking into other existing or emerging communities of practice, big questions still remain. How will open data initiatives respond to new concerns about privacy, inclusion, and artificial intelligence? And what can we learn from the last decade in order to deliver impact where it is most needed? The State of Open Data brings together over 60 authors from around the world to address these questions and to take stock of the real progress made to date across sectors and around the world, uncovering the issues that will shape the future of open data in the years to come

Data Analysis Methods for Software Systems

Using statistics, econometrics, machine learning, and functional data analysis methods, we evaluate the consequences of the lockdown during the COVID-19 pandemics for wage inequality and unemployment. We deduce that these two indicators mostly reacted to the first lockdown from March till June 2020. Also, analysing wage inequality, we conduct analysis separately for males and females and different age groups.We noticed that young females were affected mostly by the lockdown.Nevertheless, all the groups reacted to the lockdown at some level

Words Are Actions : More Efficient Measures against Hate Speech and Cyberbullying

On 14 November 2018, the Ministry of the Interior, the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Education and Culture launched a project with the task of drafting proposals for more efficient eradication of hate speech punishable under the Criminal Code and harassment prohibited by law. In the course of its work, the working group also dealt with hate campaigns and targeting. An expert working group with representatives from different fields was appointed to carry out the project. The working group was chaired by Archbishop Emeritus Kari Mäkinen, and a secretariat composed of public officials was set up to assist it. During the preparation stage of the project, the working group consulted a variety of researchers, hate crime victims, professionals working with young people, and other key stakeholders. The working group considers hate speech such a serious problem that policies for its eradication must be included in the Government Programme or another similar document and a specific action plan against hate speech must be drawn up. The working group presents a total of 13 recommendations for developing more efficient measures to tackle hate speech and cyberbullying. The recommendations can be implemented as part of the action plan to be drawn up

Open Data in Developing Economies

Recent years have witnessed considerable speculation about the potential of open data to bring about wide-scale transformation. The bulk of existing evidence about the impact of open data, however, focuses on high-income countries. Much less is known about open data’s role and value in low- and middle-income countries, and more generally about its possible contributions to economic and social development. Open Data for Developing Economies features in-depth case studies on how open data is having an impact across the developing world-from an agriculture initiative in Colombia to data-driven healthcare projects in Uganda and South Africa to crisis response in Nepal. The analysis built on these case studies aims to create actionable intelligence regarding: (a) the conditions under which open data is most (and least) effective in development, presented in the form of a Periodic Table of Open Data; (b) strategies to maximize the positive contributions of open data to development; and (c) the means for limiting open data’s harms on developing countries