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National Information Exchange Model — worth the wait!
By WDavidStephenson | August 29, 2007
More than 5 years after 
I suggested that the single most important win-win step the US could take to simultaneously improve security was to lead a global initiative to implement XML (because it would not only improve information exchange between terrorism and other criminal justice data bases, but also foster global economic development), it looks as if we’re getting somewhere.
FCW reports that Justice and Homeland Security departments are now pushing a different framework, the National Information Exchange Model (NIEM).
Some go-getters in the criminal justice field had already begun to switch to the federally-approved Global Justice XML Data Model (GJXDM) schema in the near past. Then DOJ and DHS put the brakes on, saying they were creating a more comprehensive schema, NIEM.
Ordinarily, I might be on their backs, because XML is such a valuable tool for sharing data bases that I’m in favor of quick deployment. However, the original intent for XML was to keep the number of industry-specific schema to a bare minimum, so that basic XML would be as univeral lingua franca as possible. As a result, having a broader standard that would cover a wider range of fields, including criminal justice and homeland security affiars such as disaster management, emergency response and screening people and cargo, was, IMHO, worth the wait.
The feds recently released the second production model (sounds more like a 2008-model car) of NIEM.
On first blush, the NIEM website looks like a good tool for bringing possible NIEM users up to speed, with features such as:
- an intro to NIEM
- techniques to build and extend NIEM components
- a technical overview
- briefing slides
Among other NIEM components, the “namespaces” used to categorize content include my favorite, the Common Alerting Protocol, used for emergency messages. As with other XML schemas, the tags use to classify content have common-sense names, such as “hair color,” or “US county code,” which makes it easier to code data without special training.
According to Paul Wormeli, executive director of the Integrated Justice Information System Institute, which released the standard, projects already using NIEM include:
- The FBI’s new National Data Exchange program, a national repository of criminal incident information.
- The Sentinel project, an automated case management system for federal law enforcement agencies.
- Justice’s Regional Data Exchange.
States already embracing it include New York, Texas, and Florida, which has established the Florida Law Enforcemt Exchange (FLEX) project to map data and establish new regional information sharing systems.
NIEM will play an integral role in FLEX
“‘The state quickly realized that we needed a way to share data statewide, given that we had over 400 agencies to accommodate once you include police and sheriffs’ departments,’ said Mike Phillips, FLEX project manager.
“’NIEM will give us a common translator for basic queries on suspicious persons, vehicles or local warrants,’ Phillips said. ‘Ultimately, NIEM will help provide us with seamless workflow since there will be one point of entry instead of redundant rekeying.’”
Please read the full article for details on NIEM and how it will work. Meanwhile, let’s start putting it to work!
Technorati tags:
homeland security DHS FEMA Department of Homeland Security War on Terror antiterrorism EDXL xml networked homeland security government IT collaboration criminal justice geo-spatial web web 2.0 homeland security 2.0 disaster management 2.0 disaster management /Department+of+Justice Common Alerting Protocol disaster planning disaster planning 2.0 NIEM
Topics: technology, policy and politics, collaboration, e-gov transformation, networked security | |
