Issues related to SDI implementation
Spatial Data Policy
In the UAE, till today no clear and defined data policy has been stated. A data policy should be in other sectors. In the SDI context, it constitutes the premises of a legal framework defining some basic principles specific to data, to be observed by individuals and institutions when generating, collecting, exchanging, disseminating, using data. Data in this case could be geospatial data, socio-economic data, and data policy and so on.
The proposed SDI for UAE is an attempt to establish a policy framework which will promote, direct, guide and regulate both the production and dissemination of spatial data as relevant to user needs. The importance of having a policy framework has already been recognised and a lot of thought has gone into it after extensive consultation. There is a general consensus on the kind of policy framework required and the strategy to make geographic spatial data readily available.
Geospatial data was always considered as very sensitive data with regards to national security This resulted in huge restriction and constraints on its use: The access to such a data then was confined to certain government departments only while it was restricted for the large majority of the civil society.
Therefore one of the first data policy priorities is to make the already created data assets available to a larger population of users. This can be achieved for instance by creating subsets of there geospatial data with reduced geometric and semantic accuracies
The policy will draw a number of regulation to incent or even compel spatial data producers to share their data. This will be achieved through enforcing the general principle that considers the geospatial data as produced by public sector as a public commodity.
The policy will also state clear and definite guide - lines for the pricing of such a data and its commercialization. Last but not least, the policy will have to set up the broad principles resolving the issues related to spatial data property protection.
SDI Legal Framework
The determination of the legal principles and their potential use along with the further development of Geospatial data will be of essential assistance to the spatial data community.
Legal issues that merit attention are: copyright, intellectual property protection, liability to ensure the suitability and quality of the data in the NSDI and protection of personal privacy information. Such a legal framework is needed to guarantee investment in the quality information required for successful data sharing.
In normal circumstances, the data is transformed into property and a creator seeking to recover expenses for its
creation will seek a protection of such
assets. Intellectual property protection in the form of contracts and licenses where restrictions may be imposed on further distribution are available [Cho, 2005b]. Data protection is also necessary where the data is distributed free of charge
because of the legal circumstances surrounding issues of liability and breaking of regulations.
The establishment of an SDI requires the enrolment of the country in lengthy processes. Such an undertaking is not easy in the sense that there are already several organizations involved in the field with different stages and levels of involvement, technology and legal frameworks, resulting in a complex situation with heterogeneous, sporadic sometimes antagonist laws, regulation and procedures. Homo-genizing these issues within a national framework is one of the hardest challenges the new SDI in the UAE has
to win.
The Spatial Data Infrastructure (SDI) needs to be established under a legislation that will set out essential operational features including its composition and the broad policy issues on which the NSDI will be entitled to make rules and regulations and so on. The NSDI should be empowered by legal bodies and structures so as to be able to frame laws and regulations in order to achieve its broad objectives. (Figure 1.0 showing that Legal Framework is regulating the relation between SDI components).
Spatial data is at the center activates of local and federal governments in the UAE. Therefore, imposing copyright, licensing, and other work-product protection devices has become a major concern of the government. Because GIS is a data-integrating technology and the data in most GISs is inherently local in nature, GIS has more potential for conflict with personal privacy than other information technologies. The power of GIS processing and the cross-matching of GIS datasets with other data are raising some of the strongest privacy concerns being expressed by the general public, particularly in with regard to interference by the commercial sector. It should be noted that the Federal 1992 Copyright law failed to conform to the UAE's international obligations.
A review of the legal issues that have data policy implications will show the need to protect data as an asset and property of government, individual or vendors that need to be protected by law.
The UAE therefore introduced a new Copyright Law, Number 7 of 2002 on Copyright and Related Rights, which came into force on 14 July 2002. The new Copyright Law, which superseded and repealed the 1992 Law, provides greater protection for rights' holders.
The new Copyright Law provides an exhaustive list of protected works which has been extended from the 1992 Law, and includes literary works, computer software and applications, databases, lectures and sermons, drama, musical and audiovisual works, architectural plans, artistic and photographic works, applied art, geographical maps and derivative works of art.