Watching the coverage of the Maersk Alabama piracy incident, it seemed to me that conventional responses are ineffective because of the extreme asymmetrical aspect of the situation and because conventional treaty-based mutual defense approaches aren’t relevant on the high seas.

I think my “networked homeland security” theory may be an appropriate model for response. Here’s why:

• these situations are fluid and fast-moving, so any response has to have the same fluidity.
• real-time, location-based information is critical.
• the response needs to be collaborative — reflecting “social data analysis,” in which a large number of individuals, each of whom make have some of the relevant information, can use Web 2.0 tools such as threaded discussions, wikis, etc. to analyze the situation.The likely result of such a collaborative analysis (and one, incidentally, in which the cast of characters will likely be different in every situation depending on who happens to be in the vicinity and/or has relevant information) is likely to be a more nuanced, comprehensive and accurate one than if only one analyst or a small group was involved.
• the exact mix of data will vary in each case: in some situations there may be live, streaming video available to document the situation; in some, still photos relayed by camera phone, and who knows what other information may or may not be available depending on variables such as location, weather and/or Internet access. As long as the relevant information is relayed in an IP- and packet-based fashion, it an be shared by an ad hoc network of those who happen to be in the region at the time.

Given the pirates’ asymmetrical strengths of speed and surprise, ad hoc communications and decision making through networked homeland security may be our best countervailing power…

Let me know what you think!

Technorati tags: homeland security piracy Maersk Alabama Somalia War on Terror U.S. Navy terrorism antiterrorismtechnology crowd-sourcing wisdom of crowds social data analysiscrowdsourcing smart mobs swarm intelligence emergent behavior networked homeland security current affairs government IT mobile social networks government
collaboration

However, I feel compelled to break my silence to let you know about the Vivek Kundra I know better than most — and trust implicitly!

As you may be aware, President Obama appointed him as the first U.S. CIO less than 2 weeks ago. Then, on Thursday he took a temporary leave of absence because the FBI had arrested an employee of his former office, the Office of the Chief Technology (OCTO) for the District of Columbia, and an outside contractor.

Since then, there’s been a lot of baloney and innuendo in the blogosphere that has besmirched this fine man’s reputation.

I don’t know anything more than you do about the investigation, but if anyone wants to set up a prediction market, I’ll be you dollars-to-donuts that when the truth comes out, it will show that the FBI was tipped off precisely because of policies and procedures Vivek set up immediately after he took office in early 2007.

Most important, this crime was exactly the kind of thing Vivek and Mayor Fenty worked so hard to eliminate from D.C., which unfortunately still has a reputation for corruption left over from the Marion Barry days, despite 10 years of reform mayors. They did that through a wide-ranging transparency strategy that — while it obviously hasn’t made corruption impossible — sure has made it easier for all of us, not just the FBI, to examine.

Most dramatic (and something that Vivek will bring to the feds through the new Data.gov site when he’s back on the job!) is the Citywide Data Warehouse, which feeds 274 streams of real-time, un-adulterated statistics about all sorts of DC governmental activities directly to the media,watchdogs, and the public, and invites us to scrutinize what they do. As the site says, the city views the feeds as “a catalyst ensuring agencies operate as more responsive, better performing organizations.”

In particular, I’d draw your attention to the feeds for:

• Purchase Orders 2009
• Purchase Orders 2008
• Purchase Orders 2004-2007

If memory serves (I’m too busy to check ‘em out myself right now with the book thing) these files document all purchase orders for more than $2500 during that period ( incidentally you might want to search for the names of the two accused: Yusuf Acar, chief security officer for the CTO’s office, and Sushil Bansal, an outside contractor!).

To my knowledge, no other jurisdiction anywhere provides that kind of transparency about purchasing (and, had Vivek remained on the job, he and Mayor Fenty had additional steps in mind as well). Isn’t that exactly what you and I want for the massive stimulus bill, and don’t you want a guy with that kind of dedication & imagination back on the job ASAP designing the Recovery.gov. site to make certain it offers the same degree of transparency? I do.

And, if that’s not enough I directly your attention to testimony that Vivek gave before the DC City Council on Dec. 2007, on the specific steps he’d taken to put in place policies and procedures to eliminate and uncover corruption (including creating a wiki with specific whistleblower protections for those who report corruption to the FBI — which I bet may well pan out as the impetus for the FBI investigation :

“These controls are all part of a culture of accountability and innovation that, as I mentioned in my confirmation testimony, we are actively creating throughout OCTO. Innovation not only solves problems, it’s one of the best deterrents to corruption. Accountability and innovation keep processes, and personnel, from becoming so entrenched that an individual can beat the system by knowing every process, and every person, down to the tiniest detail and then exploiting them ….. I recognize that we can’t change people’s intent to do harm. But we can do our best to prevent the bad from entering our workforce. We can help the good to report the bad so we detect fraud early. We can deter the in-between from temptation through training and a culture of transparency, accountability, and innovation.”

Was this crime deplorable? You bet! Should it have been detected earlier? We’ll have to see what comes out in the trial.

However, mark my words: eventually this case will be seen as vindicating Vivek and underscoring the need for extending this kind of transparency to the federal government. The sooner he’s back on the job the better!

Technorati tags: publicdata public data dataviz government transparency e-gov e-government 2.0 e-government transparent government e-democracy government IT government politics Democratizing Data Vivek Kundra

1. I fell hook-line-and-sinker for Twitter, which I once poo-pooed as an exercise in narcissistic navel-gazing. By contrast, I’ve found that not only is it an effective means of communicating, sometimes on pretty sophisticated topics, but also that it’s great for the kind of ad hoc emergency communication that I specialized in. Therefore, if you want to track what I’m doing, your best bet is to subscribe to my Twitter feed.
2. More important, I’m facing a really tight deadline, the end of March, to complete a book manuscript, “Democratizing Data — to transform government, workplaces, and our lives,” about what I believe is a revolutionary approach perfectly suited to the combination of circumstances we face today: total loss of faith in government and business, the need for fewer remaining workers to do more with less, and to come up with creative solutions to increasingly complex problems.I believe the democratizing data is the way:
   • making our organizations data-centric: by that I mean instead of laboriously retrieving data from organizational data bases, adding informative metadata to it with XML or KML tags, and distributing it automatically through syndication.
   • designing software (open-source is particularly well suited to this approach) so that all users will be able to automatically share the data, rather than the past practice, in which data pasted into applications was then trapped in those applications.
   • designing a seamless cycling in which workers (with varying levels of permissions based on their roles), regulators, and even the public, will have access to this data, on a real-time basis. Experience from leaders in the field have shown this can be done while respecting strict privacy and security standards.
   • The results will include:
     • giving workers the real-time, often location-based information they need to do their jobs more effectively, and to collaborate with those in other offices and programs who need to share the same data. In many cases, this will be the first time they have had access to this data
     • substituting “smart” regulation for the abysmal failures of the Bush Administration. Following the Dutch model can dramatically reduce corporate compliance costs, and improve regulation by allowing various agencies to share the same data on a real-time basis (there is some evidence such an approach might have actually avoided the excesses that led to the economic collapse).
     • rebuilding public confidence in government and business through a “don’t trust us, track us” approach to transparency that provides facts and lets the public, media and watchdog groups judge for themselves whether officials are truthful.
     • even leveraging the “crowdsourcing” phenomenon to actively involve the public as co-creators of valuable new services, as was done by the District of Columbia’s innovative “Apps for Democracy” contest.

     I’m getting great initial reaction to the approach (probably due in great part to the fact that I was originally going to co-author the book with Vivek Kundra, the charismatic DC CTO who is now likely to become the Obama Administration’s e-government director, in which case it’s likely he’d have to withdraw from the project. Whether or not Vivek is an active participant, the book reflects much of his thinking). The video above (there are 3 other sections, which you can also find on You Tube — it was a hand-held version shot by an attendee at a recent O’Reilly IgniteBoston event) will give you a good introduction to what I’m talking about, as will numerous Slideshares I’ve done.

     So that’s why I haven’t been blogging and am unlikely to resume doing so in the near future (although look for a new wiki I’ll be launching in the next week or so to test sections of the book and solicit crowd-sourcing ideas for it! See you around campus!

     Tell a friend:

     Technorati tags: publicdata public data dataviz government transparency e-gov e-government 2.0 e-government transparent government e-democracy government IT government Vivek Kundra XBRL Democratizing Data

According to state and local officials, it’s FEMA red tape that’s holding things up.

That reminds me of an interview for my book that I did yesterday with one of my personal heroes, Phil Windley, the former Utah CIO. He mentioned the 1-stop, integrated new-biz incorporation site Utah developed 6 years ago or so.

I can’t understand why FEMA can’t emulate them, with a totally Web 2.0-based, totally-transparent response approach including:

• a wiki, so that everyone involved would have instant access to the latest remediation information (and they could actually solicit ideas from the affected regions and perhaps leverage some “crowd sourcing”!)
• an integrated, XML-based application process
• and RSS feeds (they don’t bother with individual feeds for events such as Hurricane Ike: one size fits all).

BTW: the homepage for Hurricane Ike still has picture of Chertoff and talks about recovery beginning: the current DHS simply doesn’t get it about The Internet Tubes, does it? They think of it as a place for brochureware, which someone updates when they feel like it, rather than as THE central repository for real-time information. I think the 1-sentence summary of my forthcoming Democratizing Data book is relevant — and totally over their heads:

“Democratizing data, making it available through real-time structured data feeds plus visualization tools or applications powered by it, gives employees vital information when and where they need it most to manage their work effectively & collaborate, encourages organizational transparency, and allows voters or customers to participate in decision-making and idea creation.”

Indeed!

Obi-Wan Napolitano, you’re our only hope…

Technorati tags:

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As I’ve said countless times before (and this situation underscored), in natural disasters and terrorist attacks, people can and will use the Web 2.0 apps. and sophisticated mobile devices that they use every day, so it’s incumbent on authorities to:

1. instruct us on how to use these devices (especially camera and videophones) to provide invaluable situational awareness to them (LET ME KNOW IF YOUR LOCAL AUTHORITIES HAVE GIVEN YOU ANY GUIDANCE ON THIS ISSUE. DON’T WORRY ABOUT ME: I’M NOT HOLDING MY BREATH WAITING FOR EXAMPLES…)
2. monitor the social media for said situational awareness.

Ben Hedrington (thanks Ben!) has taken care of the mechanics of #2 by creating Spy. So what’s your excuse, government agencies, for not taking action on this vital concern?

Technorati tags: homeland security networked homeland security homeland security 2.0 War on Terror terrorism antiterrorism Al-Qaeda crowd-sourcing wisdom of crowds crowdsourcing smart mobs swarm intelligence emergent behavior mobile social networks Mumbai India collaboration Ben Hedrington social media Twitter Web 2.0 cameraphone

I can’t stress enough: people can and will use these devices and apps in a terrorist attack, so it is imperative that officials start telling us what kind of information would be relevant from Twitter, Flickr, etc. (and, BTW, what shouldn’t be spread: one Twitter user in Mumbai tweeted me that people were sending the exact location of people still in the hotels, and could tip off the terrorists) and that they begin to monitor these networks in disasters, terrorist attacks, etc.

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homeland security networked homeland security homeland security 2.0

If you haven’t been following it, the District of Columbia’s Apps for Democracy competition was created by the Office of the Chief Technology Officer to solicit open source apps to capitalize on the ever-growing range of structured data feeds that DC issues through its Citywide Data Warehouse, many of them released on a real-time basis.

The judging is going on as I write (you can, and should, vote right now for the “people’s choice” award), and the ceremony will be held tonight (definitely an example of “Internet Time” — everything about this competition is at warp speed).

Whomever receives the actual cash awards, you and I are already winners, because many of these apps are already available for you to use, whether you’re a DC resident or visitor, and they are sure to spawn innovative new variations and/or copies for use in other areas (oh dear: a variation won’t work in your community because it doesn’t release the data streams necessary to power the apps? don’t you think you should make a call to city hall today to demand that they do so? That’s right).

So check out the Apps for Democracy, download the ones you like (especially the iPhone ones: man, am I counting the days until Feb. 18, when I can get one under my AT & T contract!), and pressure your local pols  to follow DC’s lead.

Technorati tags: publicdata public data dataviz government transparency e-gov e-government 2.0 e-government transparent government e-democracy government IT government Apps for Democracy District of Columbia iPhone widgets crowd-sourcing wisdom of crowds crowdsourcing smart mobs swarm intelligence emergent behavior mobile social networks collaboration mesh network location-based services geo-spatial web web 2.0

Apologies in advance for “shouting.” It’s just because OUR LIVES MAY DEPEND ON WHAT I’M ABOUT TO SAY. Also apologies in advance for the snippy tone of some of this: I’m just fed up with official stupidity and myopia about the issues that I’ve devoted my life to for the past seven years — stupidity and myopia that puts all of us at increased risk and denies them the eyes and ears of concerned and empowered individuals.

OK, folks, I know that I haven’t been seen in these parts much in recent months: between my work on transparency and my near-total switch to micro-blogging on Twitter, you’ve seen little from me on homeland security and emergency planning.

In part, frankly, it’s due to the near total distain within the Bush DHS (with a few noteworthy exceptions: you guys know who you are, and I’m eternally grateful for your support..) for empowering the general public to play a critical role via Web 2.0 apps and, more important, the Web 2.0 ethos of collaboration (if you’re interested, here’s my theoretical summa on the issue). All you have to do is look at Ready.gov, which has certainly improved over the years but remains clueless about Web 2.0 (oh yeah, DHS may not get it about Web 2.0, but the bad guys do: the Army fears that al Qaeda may use our beloved Twitter to communicate about attacks).

For all our sakes, let’s hope the Obama Administration gets with the program: its general technological sophistication certainly gives one hope that will be the case.

Meanwhile, back to the urgency of this post.

It hasn’t gotten the media play it deserves, but bin Laden is reportedly planning an attack on the US that would “far outdo” 9/11!

“…a former senior Yemeni al-Qaeda operative said, the terrorist organisation has entered a ‘positive phase’, reinforcing specific training camps around the world that will lead the next ‘wave of action’ against the West.

The warning, on the front page of an Arabic newspaper published in London, Al-Quds Al-Arabi - and reported widely in the major Italian papers - quotes a person described as being ‘very close to al-Qaeda’ in Yemen.

The paper is edited by Abdel al-Bari Atwan, who is said to have been the last journalist to interview bin Laden, in 1996.

Bin Laden is himself closely following preparations for an attack against the US and aims to ‘change the face of world politics and economics’, (my emphasis) the report says.”

Put aside for a minute the utter insanity and tone-deafness bin Laden is showing by contemplating a huge attack in wake of election of The Most Popular Person in the Entire World (I’d imagine it would take President Obama about 10 minutes to put together a Coalition of the Eager that would roughly contain the entire UN membership to obliterate bin Laden once and for all!!!).

If he does launch such an attack, this would be the ultimate test of what I’ve been preaching since 9/11: that the advent of increasingly sophisticated networked portable personal communication devices and Web 2.0 apps to capitalize on them mean that you and I will play a major role in preparation and response for an attack, WHETHER OR NOT OFFICIALS WANT US TO (and, as I’ve chronicled since then, that’s just what has happened during Katrina, the San Diego wildfires, and this year’s hurricanes).

Here’s what you need to do (what I need to do is a quick update on new apps and devices that give even more options for ad hoc emergency communications, so mail to tag: e-mail me your suggestions on additions, and check back frequently!):

• read the VITA Advisory tips I created for the Wireless Foundation on smart use of wireless devices in emergencies
• read the expanded version of the tips I’ve created under my “21st-century disaster tips you WON’T hear from officials” (sadly, that title is still valid: please prove me wrong, officials…).In the case of things such as downloading the CUWiN software that would allow you to create an ad hoc community mesh network if The Internet Tubes are down, or programming “ICE” numbers on your cell, do it now.
• watch the YouTube videos I’ve created on some of the tips (sorry for the crinkly-eye squint, it’s genetic…)
• get the free materials from Ready.gov (they’re pretty good, but just not comprehensive) and my peeps at the American Red Cross.
• subscribe to my buddy John Solomon’s blog: he’s taken up the slack as I’ve moved on, and does a great job (get well quick, John).
• since no one else seems to remember how the civilian population was deputized to be on the lookout for spies durng WW II, check the phenomenal website of Pennsylvania’s great Terrorism
  Awareness and Protection site which will not only tell you what kind of info officials could use about an impending terror attack, but reminds you of Bill of Rights and their protection of free speech, something which may come back into vogue on Jan. 20…)
• let your local police and fire departments know about apps such as Twitter, Qik and Flickr that you and your friends will use in a disaster and which could provide them with invaluable situational awareness — if only they know to look for it (snarky aside: I contacted International Association of Chiefs of Police, suggesting they have me speak on this issue at their conference this month, especially since it’s being held in San Diego, where mobile social networks really came to the fore during the wildfires. Why am I not surprised that they never returned the call? But I digress).

One final request: three years ago I created a highly-praised series of data bases for smartphones and PDAs, which allowed you to find detailed info. about what to do after a disaster in only 3 clicks. That way, if you lost all communications ability, as long as one person in a group had the application on their smartphone or PDA, s/he would be able to help others respond, and thereby lessen the burden on first responders.

In all modesty, it was a fantastic service, and I always hope that some agency or foundation would pay me to expand and maintain it and to make it available for free to everyone (that would certainly be an indication that government got it about Web 2.0, eh?). However, no one did, and the modest sales of the subscription version didn’t warrant me maintaining it on your own.

If I had a contract in the next week, I could bring it up to date within a month, and, I hope, also port it to iPhones. Given how pervasive smartphones and iPhones are today, an updated, free to download “Terrorism Survival Planner” could and should be a critical part of a comprehensive terrorism and disaster preparation and response program.

Please contact anyone you know who could pony the modest amount of money it would take to make it worth my while (despite what my wife thinks, I’m not a 501c3…)  and I’ll spring into action.

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homeland security DHS FEMA Department of Homeland Security networked homeland security homeland security 2.0 War on Terror Iraq War terrorism antiterrorism Al-Qaeda bin Laden civil liberties crowd-sourcing wisdom of crowds crowdsourcing smart mobs swarm intelligence emergent behavior mobile social networks collaboration

IMHO, the critical thing is to not view transparency as an add-on program that people might fear would increase costs at a time of record deficits, but as part of a carefully-integrated program, modeled on what DC is doing, that would also provide real-time structured data behind the firewall.

It would give federal workers, for the first time, access to real-time data (the same data that would be available to watchdog groups such as the Sunlight Foundation and entrepreneurs who could use it to create new services) that they desperately need to do their jobs more effectively in hard times. It will help them break down arbitrary boundaries between agencies and programs, find synergies and redundancies, and encourage collaboration and emergence of wisdom of the crowds. We can’t afford not to launch these programs.

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