Big Data, Big Impact? The Future of Gender-Sensitive Data Systems

On November 12, Data2X organized a daylong convening culminating five years of work on the promise – and challenges – of big data for gender.

In partnership with The GovLab at NYU, Data2X brought together research, industry, and policy leaders to discuss the next steps in creating a secure, durable, and policy-relevant big data system that accurately represents and can deliver for women and girls.

30 speakers, 10 research teams, and over 130 guests participated in a series of panel discussions, presentations, and debates, held at the Ford Foundation for Social Justice in New York.

Big Data, Big Impact? The Future of Gender-Sensitive Data Systems marked the launch of a new report on this subject addressed two key questions:

1. How can big data be used to tackle gender issues and what are the factors that enable success? 
2. How can we maximize the potential of big data for gender while also effectively addressing issues that may negatively impact women and girls, including privacy, transparency, and ensuring community participation?

This event had eight sessions, all of which can be watched here. See below for a sampling of photos and the full list of speakers.

• Session 1: Gender in the New Data Landscape
  • Nuria Oliver, Director of Research in Data Science, Vodafone; Chief Data Scientist at Data-Pop Alliance
  • Julia Kempe, Director of NYU’s Center for Data Science
  • Emily Courey Pryor, Executive Director, Data2X (moderator)

• Session 2: Big Data, Big Impact: Towards Gender-Sensitive Data Systems
  • Bapu Vaitla, Fellow, Data2X

• Session 3: Research Flash Presentations I
  • Ridhi Kashyap, Associate Professor of Social Demography, Nuffield College, University of Oxford, Using Facebook and Google Advertising Data to Measure the Digital Gender Divide
  • Muhammad Raza Khan, Applied Scientist, Microsoft; University of California Berkeley, Educational Inequality and Mobile Phone Data
  • Claudio Bosco, Senior Research Associate, Flowminder Foundation, Towards High-Resolution Sex-Disaggregated Dynamic Mapping
  • Andrew Young, Knowledge Director, The GovLab at NYU (moderator)

• Session 4: Data-Knowledge-Action-Impact: Creating the Enabling Environment
  • Sunita Kishor, Director, Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) Program
  • Alex ‘Sandy’ Pentland, Professor of Media Arts and Sciences; Toshiba Professor; Media Lab Entrepreneurship Program Director, MIT
  • Katherine Hay, Deputy Director for Gender Equality, The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
  • Mayra Buvinic, Senior Fellow, Data2X

• Session 5: Research Flash Presentations II
  • Jihad Zahir, Assistant Professor, Cadi Ayyad University, Mining the Web for Insights on Violence Against Women
  • Frederic Pivetta, Managing Partner, Dalberg Data Insights, Mobile Money & Gender in Uganda
  • Mehi Mirpourian, Senior Data Analyst, Research, Monitoring and Evaluation, Women’s World Banking, Analyzing Big Data to Understand Uptake and Usage of Financial Services to Advance Women’s Financial Inclusion
  • Nina Rabinovitch Blecker, Director of Communications, Data2X (moderator)

• Session 6: Value versus Values: Balancing the Benefits of Big Data for Gender
  • Megan Smith, Founder and CEO, shift7; former Chief Technology Officer of the United States
  • Caroline Nevejan, Professor by Special Appointment, Amsterdam School for Social Science Research, University of Amsterdam; Chief Science Officer, City of Amsterdam
  • Tom Smith, Managing Director, Data Science Campus, UK Office for National Statistics
  • Anna Lerner Nesbit, Program Manager of Global Impact: Data and AI, Facebook
  • Karen Hao, Artificial Intelligence Reporter, MIT Technology Review (moderator)

• Session 7: Research Flash Presentations III
  • Sean Higgins, Assistant Professor of Finance, Northwestern University; UC Berkeley, Gender-Differentiated Credit Scoring Algorithms
  • Emma Samman, Research Associate, Overseas Development Institute, Women and the Digital Gig Economy in South Africa
  • Stefaan Verhulst, Co-founder, Chief Research and Development Officer, The GovLab at NYU, Gender Gaps in Urban Mobility
  • Eleanor Carey, Senior Technical Manager, Data2X (moderator)

• Session 8: The Future of Gender Sensitive Data Systems
  • Anousheh Ansari, CEO, XPrize Foundation
  • Vivienne Ming, Co-Founder, Socos Labs
  • Emily Courey Pryor, Executive Director, Data2X
  • Stefaan Verhulst, Co-Founder and Chief Research and Development Officer, The GovLab at NYU (moderator)