The Data Quality Act: Developing IQ Standards in a Political Environment

Executive Summary/Abstract: The “Data Quality Act” is a recent law in the United States requiring every federal agency in the U.S. Government to produce information quality guidelines. It further implies that the agencies are required to follow those guidelines giving them the effect of standards. At the U. S. Department of Transportation we have written guidelines to comply with the Act, improve data quality, and create a consistency across our data systems. Doing this in the political environment of the federal government adds additional challenges that had to be addressed in the development process. This presentation will describe how we simultaneously addressed data quality and the realities of implementation. 7th International Conference on Information Quality (IQ-2002)