The use of facial recognition software to support law enforcement efforts is nothing new – in the movies that is. In 1997, the sci-fi classic The Fifth Element equipped its futuristic airborne police vehicles with tools that let officers compare facial scans of the movie’s mysterious alien heroine to a central criminal database in the hope of making an identification.

Twenty years on, scenarios like this are fast becoming normalized.

Data is everywhere in government but turning that data into actionable information and insights remains a persistent problem. “We are data rich and information poor,” said Shelley Metzenbaum, a former associate director for performance and personnel management at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) at a recent IBM Center for The Business of Government session on “Envision Government in 2040”.

At DLT, July is Big Data Month, where we will be highlighting all things big data in the public sector.  To kick off Big Data Month, we sat down with DLT Chief Data Scientist Sherry Bennett to get her insights into what is going on the world of public sector data and analytics:

INTERVIEWER: So Sherry, what's your story and what led you to DLT?

On Tax Day, 2018, the unthinkable (but not unexpected) happened. The IRS’ IT system crashed after a hardware issue took down a number of apps including those that interface with third-party tax preparation software as well as the IRS Direct Pay application.

IRS IT Systems are Decades Old

Blockchain is no longer just a buzzword or simply a “technology to watch.” This database technology is being explored by agencies across government, from the General Services Administration (GSA) to Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), from the Federal Maritime Commission to military supply chain professionals across the Department of Defense (DoD).

The promise of blockchain is dramatic. It can help enhance agencies’ business processes and provide far greater transparency and efficiency.

Government shutdowns are a costly business. The 2013 shutdown cost $24 billion in lost economic output while the 1996 shutdown resulted in $2.1 billion in government costs. We are yet to learn the impact, if any, of the three-day 2018 shutdown.

But, what we do know is that shutdowns are not universal. For many critical government employees, the lights never go out. Here’s just a shortlist:

Veterans Affairs (VA) remained operational.

Take your cloud data, database data, HR data, financial data, throw it in a blender and what have you got? Data soup! It may as well be. You have all the right ingredients, but no recipe for pulling it all together. As we accumulate more data, across disparate data sources, the challenge for today’s government data analyst are multiple:

Public sector leaders are facing an uphill battle when it comes to managing data. Their needs are growing while their budgets are often shrinking. How can federal agencies do more with less?

Leveraging enterprise open source solutions is part of the answer. They can help agencies close this gap and meet today’s needs—whether that’s analyzing warfighter data or building Smart Cities—while also planning for tomorrow’s challenges.

The U.S. Government spends trillions of dollars on benefits programs like Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid each year. Unfortunately, billions of those dollars are improperly paid, reducing the benefits to those who most rely upon them. In 2016, the White House estimated these losses at $144B.

Improper payments, fraud, and abuse takes many forms, consider some of these examples of Medicaid fraud and abuse:

With a constant influx of data, one of the biggest challenges facing government agencies is determining “What is the right data?” or “What data does my agency need for mission success?”

Then, once the data is discovered, how do you make that data actionable? How do you integrate and visualize it for better insights?