Solutions to the Big Data Challenge at the UN World Data Forum

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Big data offers promises to better support and facilitate the delivery of the Sustainable Development Goals. And Robert Kirkpatrick, the director of United Nations Global Pulse, believes big data is what governments will need to achieve the SDGs.

Yet the information collected on a daily basis from millions, through wearable fitness monitors, mobile phones, or social media giants, is often taken without public knowledge and comes with a raft of complications. Speaking at the session “Big Data for Sustainable Development: What does it take to get to the next level?” at the U.N. World Data Forum, Kirkpatrick said that data misuse, and its possibility, is harming progress on big data. He acknowledged that the “data revolution had been delayed,” with many big data projects never moving beyond the pilot stage.