ECS Professors update UK Cabinet on public data access

Prime Minster Gordon Brown with Professor Sir Tim Berners-Lee (left) and Professor Nigel Shadbolt (right)

ECS Professors Nigel Shadbolt and Sir Tim Berners-Lee, creator of the World Wide Web, visited No.10 Downing Street last week to update the Cabinet on progress on making government data more open and accessible.

Work on this project began in June, when the two Professors were asked to advise the UK Government on opening up public data. The initiative is intended to help drive culture change in Whitehall toward an assumption of total publication for anonymous data using open standards.

It will also promote international liaison and global standards-setting as an investment in future international data-sharing. According to the Prime Minister's Office: 'The Government hopes the data project will benefit the UK by creating jobs, driving new economic growth and allowing the re-use of government data to encourage the development of new, innovative information-based businesses and services.'

During the Cabinet meeting Sir Tim Berners-Lee outlined the goal of delivering a single online access point to government information, similar to that introduced by the Obama Administration in the US.