Big Data
Though Data2X believes that advances in gender data cannot happen without improvements to existing data systems, we also recognize that new data sources can provide deep insight into the lives of women and girls. At the same time, we recognize that advances in data collection and analysis, such as algorithms and machine learning, can reproduce gender bias.
Our work on big data ensures that gender is included in cutting-edge big data research and explores ways to complement insights from established data sources with those gleaned from big data while protecting the privacy and security of women and girls.
What is Big Data?
Big data is digital information that is available at high granularity in both space and time. It has the potential to fill critical gaps in our knowledge about the lives of women and girls. This data may be produced as a by-product of everyday interactions with digital products, or services, such as mobile devices and internet activity. This data holds great potential as a source of gender insights because it is often available at an individual level; it conveys what people do (e.g., behavior shown through mobile phone use), not what they say (e.g., survey response); and it is produced and recorded continuously without extra cost.
Data2X has influenced academic and private sector data scientists to focus on priority gender data challenges in their work by landscaping the field and funding pioneering research using many different kinds of digital information, including cell phone, social media, and satellite data.
What’s Next?
Over the next five years, Data2X will assess the demand for big data by policymakers and other decision-makers and establish strategic partnerships and multistakeholder collaboratives to increase access and use to big data while protecting the rights of women and girls and addressing systemic challenges such as algorithmic bias.
The latest news from Data2X
Understand emerging gender data issues and trends.
Blog
Data Co-ops: How Cooperative Structures Can Support Women’s Empowerment
(This blog post was cross-posted from the Future Development blog’s (The Brookings
read more →
Knowledge Brief
Gender and Political Party Differences in U.S. Governors’ Twitter Use on COVID-19
In the United States, governors’ recommendations and policies have played a key role in COVID-19
read more →