Managing Confidentiality:Building Blocks for Protection and Access of Health Information

Use of community documentation and data access standards

Doug Nebert and Mark

Reichardt, U.S. Federal Geographic Data Committee

NSDI As A Model for EffectiveCritical Data Management
        - Mechanisms for data inventory, discovery, access, and use
        - Metadata to accurately manage and qualify information
        - Clearinghouse 

as a means to advertise to research community AND the public

with geographic data potentially relevant to health topic analysis

National Spatial Data InfrastructureDefined
        - Is the enterprise under which we seek to promote access and sharing of geospatial information 
        - Created through Presidential Executive Order 12906 in April 1994 for federal agencies and their partners
        - Provides Geodata, Standards, Metadata, Clearinghouses, and key partnerships to accelerate geographic information sharing

How NSDI Applies to Health 

 Unifying infrastructure for spatial data management

National, international metadata standards to assure accurate inventory, and search

Established network of Clearinghouses with national and global reach for data access

Mechanisms to advertise data existence while safeguarding content

Partnerships with federal, state, local, tribal governments, private sector, academia, and international organizations

Who is involved?

 US Federal Government agencies (17)

 35 state geo-information councils

 National States Geographic Info Council

 National Association of Counties

 National League of Cities

 Universities (UCGIS)

 Open GIS Consortium

 Ecological and conservation groups

Government Role in Infrastructure

 Building reliable Internet infrastructure design, establishing the backbone

 Managing the enabling application layer

 We cannot imagine the limits of how the spatial data infrastructure will be populated or what applications will live upon it! 

Points of NSDI participation
        - Organizations document and inventory available geospatial data using standard conventions
        - Metadata standard provides structured vocabulary for description
        - Framework supports ‘standard’ data content
        - Clearinghouse provides a method to discover available information and traverse links to public or conditional data

“Metadata” are Gold for Spatial Information Management
        - Metadata are descriptive elements that characterize an information resource
        - Used with Z39.50 Catalog techniques, offers exacting capability for search – much better than search engines on the web
        - If there are “data” there can be “metadata” or data about data

A continuum...

Metadata

Data

Card Catalog

Database

Attributes

What are the Benefits of Using Metadata?
        - Inventory - Describe existing resources for local use 
        - Advertise - Support basic discovery of existing data (catalog)
        - Documentation  - Provide for advised re-use of data based on its history, quality and intent (liability)

What are the Benefits of Metadata?
        - Community Policing – Baltimore Police thought their staff “twice removed” from metadata.  They now see metadata as part of the solution for spatial data management in times of growth and staff turnover.

What are the Benefits of Metadata?
        - State Government – Montana, Washington states see improvement in operations.  Less time required for data discovery, more time on applications to meet new needs.   Customers have improved access to information from many sources

What are the Benefits of Metadata?
        - Central America – Experience with Hurricane Mitch showed the high degree of redundant collection and data generation.  Clearinghouses now being implemented to improve management and accessibility of spatial information

What are the Benefits of Metadata?
        - National Biological Information Infrastructure – Growing National effort to consistently manage, access and share biological data.  www.nbii.gov

Pre-Regional Crime Analysis

Now...

Auto Theft and Recovery Locations and Auto Theft Hot Spots

This map shows the need for a regional focus and the similarity of auto theft hot spots using two different methods.

Requirements...
        - We needed a formal vocabulary and structure to capture descriptions of our information assets
        - We sought interoperability of fields and services with other kindred activities and to leverage existing expertise and software
        - We sought flexibility in implementation and design to satisfy internal and external requirements

FGDC Content Standard for Digital Geospatial Metadata (CSDGM)
        - Published in 1994 as a cooperative national effort
        - Provides common content model for descriptive information for geographic data
        - Contains detailed structure to accommodate desired level of description
        - Guidance on what’s optional and repeatable

“Minimum set” of FGDC fields

Identification Information

Originator

Publication Date

Title

Edition

Geospatial Presentation Form

Publication Place

Publisher

Online Linkage

Abstract

Purpose

Supplemental Information

Beginning Date

Ending Date

Currentness Reference

Progress

Maintenance and Update Frequency

West Bounding Coordinate

East Bounding Coordinate

North Bounding Coordinate

South Bounding Coordinate

Theme Keyword Thesaurus

Theme Keyword

Place Keyword Thesaurus

Place Keyword

Temporal Keyword Thesaurus

Temporal Keyword

Access Constraints

Use Constraints

Browse Graphic File Name

Browse Graphic Caption

Browse Graphic File Type

Spatial Data Organization Info.

Direct Spatial Reference Method

Distribution Information

Contact Organization

Contact Person

Address Type

Address

City

State or Province

Postal Code

Country

Contact Voice Telephone

Contact Facsimile Telephone

Contact Electronic Mail Address

Resource Description

Distribution Liability

Metadata Reference Info.

Metadata Date

Contact Organization

Contact Person

Address Type

Address

City

State or Province

Postal Code

Country 	

Contact Voice Telephone

Contact Facsimile Telephone

Contact Electronic Mail Address

NSDI Publishing Methodology

Metadata

preparation

Metadata

validation/

staging

Metadata

publication

User

access

Metadata and Privacy
        - FGDC CSDGM standard includes security elements
        - Metadata at the aggregate level (e.g. data set or product) are encouraged to be published for search
        - Data provider decides what level of access to provide through “Online Linkage” element

Online Linkage
        - Used to provide Network-accessible URL:

May link directly to data download location for small public data

May link to subsetting program to provide user control over data to be received

May link to an order form for distribution of large or protected data sets

FGDC Metadata is Going Global
        - International consensus being built on structured metadata within a broader Geomatics Standard under ISO TC 211
        - ISO 19115 (draft) reflects existing metadata standards efforts
        - Specifies content, like FGDC Content Standard for Digital Geospatial Metadata

Convergence to an International Metadata Standard

FGDC

others

TC287

ANZLIC

ISO

TC 211

Metadata 

Standard

Existing National, Regional and International Standards

Estimated Approval

October 2000

ISO 19115 Profiles
        - Essential

Intended primarily for use in cataloguing spatial data sets

Includes approximately 50 fields

Does cover the “who,” “what,” “when,” “where,” “why,” and “how” topics better than FGDC minimum mandatory

ISO 19115 Profiles
        - Full Metadata

Includes catalog elements and structures

Extensive detail to allow for comprehensive description, including special coverage of raster and imagery information

Largely conditional and optional elements and structures

Will look familiar to FGDC users

National Profile of ISO 19115
        - Adopt ISO version without change
        - Clarify National Profile

Either way, it means that the current metadata standard will transition to and be replaced by the ISO standard

Publishing Method: Clearinghouse
        - The Clearinghouse is a distributed network that includes:

a registry of servers

several WWW-to-Z39.50 gateways

many Z39.50 servers
        - A primary goal of Clearinghouse is the ability to find spatial data throughout the entire community, not one site at a time
        - Clearinghouse will not operate without Metadata

Process Flow

Author

Databases

Server

User

Web

Gateway

Server

Server

Data

Metadata

Metadata

Data

Server

Internal

User

Intranet

Internet

Essential Configuration

Gateway

Access

Server

Web

Client

Node

Node

Node

Node

Clearinghouse Sites

NSDI Clearinghouse Growth 1999

0

20

40

60

80

100

120

140

160

180

200

Jun-95

Jun-96

Feb-97

Dec-97

Sep-98

Mar-99

Jun-99

Sep-99

Nov-99

Intn'l

Domestic

Gateway

Total

Clearinghouse Interfaces
        - Access to Clearinghouse may be via:

formal Gateway search forms hosted at FGDC and participating organizations

Custom “local” access web forms

Custom applications that support standard search using ISO 23950/Z39.50 
        - Next slides show one customized search

Metadata Solutions
        - Numerous software solutions available
        - Commercial and free-ware
        - Standalone, DB-linked, GIS-linked
        - Permit collection and structuring of FGDC-compatible metadata
        - Present metadata as HTML, XML, or text

Server Solutions
        - ISO 23950/Z39.50 Protocol is used
        - “GEO” Geospatial Metadata Profile is published for Z39.50 implementers to understand FGDC metadata structures
        - Supports search across numeric, text, date, and spatial extent and full-text
        - Freeware and commercial solutions 

Who’s in Clearinghouse?
        - 199 Nodes (servers) online as of 2/14/2000

25% Federal or national scope

30% State/University state-wide scope

25% International scope or location

20% Local or Regional scope

How do servers cooperate?
        - Global registry of Clearinghouse servers is maintained by FGDC on behalf of the Global Spatial Data Infrastructure activity
        - Each gateway communicates with the server registry to update search forms and parameters
        - “Server of servers” will provide for intelligent selection of servers based on server metadata (Q2 FY 2000)

Future Directions 
        - Integration with web mapping and distributed GIS through the OpenGIS Consortium Interoperability Program and “testbeds”
        - Improved capabilities and toolkits for applications programmers wanting access
        - Integration of GIS and browser clients with NSDI publishing and client functionality

Goal:  A Global Clearinghouse Enabled 

Through Partnerships, Standards, Technology

Businesses

s

Consumers

s

Government

s

Users

Registered

Data 

Servers

Imagery

Web-Enabled 

Services

Map

Services

Catalog

Services

Service

Registry

Internet

Elevation

Hydrography

Demographics

Health

Geodetic

Control

Transportation

Internet

 Clearinghouse

Economic
        - E-Commerce
        - Authentication
        - Other

Metadata

Metadata

Metadata

Metadata

Metadata

Metadata

Metadata

Crime

Environment

Combine the successes to date with open technology protocols, catalog services, map services, and other registered WWW services, and we could see a near term future of greatly enhanced applications that can search, access, and exploit a vastly expanded world of geographic data.  

None of this could have happened without the focused efforts of national spatial data infrastructures working together toward a core set of common goals.  

	Standards

	Best Practices

	Clearinghouses

	Metadata

200 Independent Nodes?

NSDI

One Common Access Method

For more information:

Visit the FGDC website: 	http://www.fgdc.gov

Contact the Clearinghouse Coordinator, Doug Nebert (ddnebert@usgs.gov) or 

Mark Reichardt (mreichardt@usgs.gov)