In the wake of the August 4th explosion in Beirut, there was a significant response from civil society trying to help in every way possible. Some NGOs undertook the task of distributing essential and urgent humanitarian aid, while others prepared for the reconstruction phase. The organizations working on all these tasks require data about the affected communities in order to carry them out. The data collected includes personally identifiable information (PII) about individuals and households, as well as data about the physical infrastructure of the area. In order to reduce duplication of efforts, many organizations are interested in sharing this data publicly.

With more data available, organizations are able to optimize their efforts. But opening data is not an obvious process, and organizations might have questions about privacy, security, licensing, and attribution of their datasets. For this reason, SMEX is offering our services and experience in open data to organizations and individuals interested in sharing their data publicly.

If you or your organization have any questions about opening your data, please contact Majd Al-Shihabi ([email protected]) with your questions.

(Feature image via Jo Kassis/Pexels).