What we do
Based at MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, the Decentralized Information Group was founded and is led by Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web and Daniel Weitzner, the former White House Deputy CTO for Internet Policy. DIG's work is closely coordinated with the activities of the World Wide Web Consortium, the international standards-setting organization for the Web.
At DIG, we explore the consequences of information on the Web: Where it comes from, what happens to it, and what are the rules for using it. Some of the issues we think about are: What do social networks reveal about you and your friends? How can linking across scientific databases promote research? What are the policies that determine how government agencies can share data? How can we promote good impacts of information sharing, while minimizing risks and harmful effects? In our work, we take the perspective that information on the Web should travel together with additional data that says where the information comes from (provenance and context) and how it should be used (policy). We build tools to help people control the policies governing information, and we build automated reasoning systems to help determine whether information use complies with policy. Learn more.
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Tim Berners-Lee gives Introduction to Linked Open Data which is a way to unlock our data and reframe the way we use it together presented at TED 2009 |
Danny Weitzner presents testimony on accountable systems architecture to the US Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board hearing on NSA surveillance issues. |
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Hal Abelson's "Myths about Privacy" talk which clarifies the various misconceptions regarding Privacy and Security on the web presented at the W3C Privacy and Data Usage Workshop 2010 |
Some of our Projects
 Tabulator Extension: A Firefox Extension that provides a human-readable interface for linked data. It is based on the Tabulator browser for Semantic Web information (RDF). [Paper, Presentation] |
 Semantic Clipboard: An enhancement to the Tabulator Extension that allows cutting and pasting of pictures that preserves policy information such as the copyright license. [Paper, Presentation, Screencast] |
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Semantic Web Widget Library: A Javascript library for creating user interfaces for viewing and editing Semantic Web data, in a way that can be integrated into any Website. [Thesis] |
Accountable Information Usage in Fusion Center Information Sharing Environments: A demonstration system for Department of Homeland Security to support sharing of information by Fusion Centers in a way that complies with applicable law and policy. Fusion Centers are the contact points for cooderinating information between Federal, State and Local law enforcement and intelligence agencies.[Paper, Screencast] |
Selected Publications
- Daniel J. Weitzner, Harold Abelson, Tim Berners-Lee, Joan Feigenbaum, James Hendler, and Gerald Jay Sussman; Information Accountability, in Communications of the ACM, 51 , 6, June 2008. A high-level introduction to the information accountability perspective as an alternative and a complement to access control.
- T. Berners-Lee, W. Hall, J. Hendler, N. Shadbolt, D. Weitzner; Creating a Science of the Web. Science Vol 313, 11 August 2006.
- Daniel J. Weitzner , Harold Abelson, Tim Berners-lee , Chris Hanson , James Hendler , Lalana Kagal , Deborah L. Mcguinness , Gerald Jay Sussman , K. Krasnow Waterman; Transparent Accountable Data Mining: New Strategies for Privacy Protection,AAAI Spring Symposium on The Semantic Web meets eGovernment, 2006.
- Weitzner, Hendler, Berners-Lee, Connolly, Creating the Policy-Aware Web: Discretionary, Rules-based Access for the World Wide Web
- Design Issues: Technical and philosophical notes on web architecture. A series of notes about how the web actually works and how to design new technology.
Courses
- MIT 6.805 - Ethics and Law on the Electronic Frontier (Hal Abelson and Daniel Weitzner)
Current News
- June 26, 2014:"Private Castles in the Cloud" by Hal Abelson
- June 15, 2014:"Who’s using your data?New Web technology would let you track how your private data is used online." Tim Berners-Lee, Lalana Kagal and Oshani Seneviratne
