High-Level Event on Data Responsibility in Humanitarian Action
Channel: OCHA Centre for Humanitarian Data
Date: 2020-12-17

Live webinar featuring speakers from OCHA, DG ECHO, UNHCR, IMPACT / REACH, and ICRC. Recorded 17 December 2020.

Data responsibility — the safe, ethical, and effective management of data — is a critical issue for humanitarians. The stakes are high: data can enable more effective and efficient humanitarian response, but as organizations process increasingly large volumes of data, they face more complex challenges. Ensuring we ‘do no harm’ while maximizing the benefits of data requires collective action that extends across the humanitarian system. This is especially relevant in light of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has exacerbated existing humanitarian emergencies around the world and increased the sector’s reliance on digital technologies and data.

In January 2019, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) Centre for Humanitarian Data initiated a project to increase trust and cooperation within the humanitarian data ecosystem with support from the Directorate-General for European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations (DG ECHO). As the two-year project comes to a close, the OCHA Centre for Humanitarian Data and DG ECHO are organizing a high-level virtual event to share lessons learned and examine the systemic challenges and opportunities that lie ahead for collective action on data responsibility. The discussion will feature experts from across the humanitarian system and highlight strategies for data responsibility in practice.