Big data- vast amounts of digital data, gathered from a multitude of sources- large, raw, unstructured and abundant with business intelligence. It is also complete with challenges such as complexity, risks to privacy and a requirement for technology and human expertise.
Decision making in Government requires a large number of stakeholders- officials, groups, citizens for example, all requiring a cohesive format that would allow for analytics. Governments expect big data to enhance the standard that is in place to best serve their citizens as well as addressing other areas such as environment, economy, voting, health and employment.
Data security and privacy is the primary concern for Government big data as collecting and storing it requires ‘big data security’- the process of guarding data and analytics processes from threats that could compromise confidentiality.