Open Data Directive

Issue Date: April 1, 2016

Latest Updates: August 6, 2019

Management Board of Cabinet

Table of Contents

1. Introduction

2. Purpose

3. Application and Scope

4. Principles

5. Requirements

6. Open Data Engagement

7. Definitions

8. Responsibilities

Appendix A Open Government Licence Ontario

Appendix B Approval Authorities

Date of Amendment	Description of Amendment	Page Reference
June 4, 2019	Addition of the option to use an alternate open licence, rather than the requirement to exclusively use the Open Government Licence.	6, 8, 9,11
June 4, 2019	Acknowledging responsibilities of Chief Digital and Data Officer	7, 8, 9, 10, 13
June 4, 2019	Change in approval release level from Deputy Minister to Program Director	12, 13
June 4, 2019	Reference to International Open Data Charter	5
June 4, 2019	Removal of Appendices B-D on advice of legal as contained content better suited to a guidebook
June 4, 2019	Addition of new Appendix B outlining for information on approval authority and delegation of authority
June 4, 2019	Housekeeping edits (reflecting transition of Open Government from TBS to ODS, CAB, fixing capitalization to align with best practices)	Throughout the document

1 Introduction

This Directive outlines requirements for ministries and provincial agencies on listing all data inventories, publishing open data, and preparing information systems to support ongoing open data requirements.

The open data initiative supports government efficiency, effectiveness and innovation. Faster and easier access to government data through a one-window data portal facilitates evidence-based policy, informs service delivery and promotes greater transparency and accountability.

The open data initiative also supports public engagement and participation by allowing Ontarians to develop their own analysis, insights, and digital products.

To support this implementation of the directive, an Open Data Guidebook is available as a tool and resource to Ontario ministries and provincial agencies.

The Open Data Directive is a Management Board of Cabinet Directive, issued under the Management Board of Cabinet Act.

2 Purpose

The purpose of this directive is to maximize access to data by requiring that government data be open by default unless exempted from release in limited and specific circumstances as specified in this directive.

For the purpose of this directive, “data” is defined as facts, figures and statistics objectively measured according to a standard or scale, such as frequency, volumes or occurrences, but does not include Information (as defined by this directive).

This directive:

• Instructs ministries and provincial agencies to release government data that they create, collect, and/or manage as open data, unless the data is exempt from release as open data, pursuant to this directive.

• Defines principles and requirements for publishing government data as open data.

• Promotes a culture of openness and collaboration both within the public service and externally with the people of Ontario.

3 Application and Scope

This directive applies to all Ontario ministries and provincial agencies.

This directive applies to all government data.

This directive promotes data management practices which enable the proactive and ongoing release of government data and is to be implemented in a manner that is consistent with existing legal obligations, restrictions and requirements, including the Simpler, Faster, Better Services Act, 2019, the Archives and Recordkeeping Act, 2006, the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, 1990, the Personal Health Information Protection Act, 2004, the French Language Services Act, 1990, and the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act, 2005 or other applicable legislation.

4 Principles

Government data is open by default unless exempted from release in limited and specific circumstances as specified in this directive.

Personal Information is not to be released as open data under the terms of the Open Government Licence – Ontario (OGL) and/or a similar open licence. However, where there is sufficient statutory authority to release personal information, and where it is appropriate, personal information may be made available in a machine-readable format.

Government ensures exempted data remains secure and is managed responsibly.

When government data can be made available to the public, it will be released over the internet in an open format, at no charge to the user, and will be released under the Open Government Licence – Ontario (see Appendix A) and/or a similar open licence where appropriate.

Open data, to the fullest extent possible, is available in its original, unmodified form.

Open data is accurate, timely, openly accessible, interpretable, coherent and primary (adapted from the Statistics Canada Data Quality Guidelines) and released in accordance with the principles in the International Open Data Charter.

5 Requirements

The directive requires government data be open by default unless exempted from release in limited and specific circumstances as set out below:

• Data that is subject to statutory confidentiality requirements, (i.e. exempt from publication under the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, 1990, the Personal Health Information Protection Act, 2004 and/or other statutes).

• Data that should not be disclosed for legal, security, confidentiality, privacy or commercial sensitivity reasons.

5.1 Data Inventory:

1. The Chief Digital and Data Officer will establish, coordinate and maintain a comprehensive government-wide data inventory. This data inventory will be published online and will be accessible to the public.

2. The Chief Digital and Data Officer will identify common core metadata elements and data standards, where applicable, to describe items listed in the inventory.

3. Each ministry and provincial agency must create an inventory of datasets within its custody and control.

4. Each ministry who has custody and control of datasets must contribute to the government-wide data inventory by providing to the Chief Digital and Data Officer a listing of all datasets or categories of data.

5. Provincial agencies must publish their inventories on a new web page on their site or, in its absence, another government website in accordance with the Open Data Guidebook and provide the link to their inventory to the Chief Digital and Data Officer.

6. Ministries and provincial agencies are responsible for keeping their inventory list up-to-date on an ongoing basis.

7. Ministries and provincial agencies must identify any dataset which cannot be made accessible to the public as open data on its inventory. In addition to identifying such datasets, the ministry or provincial agency must provide a detailed explanation as to why the dataset cannot be made accessible to the public as open data (e.g., exempt because of legislation, contains personal, confidential or commercially sensitive information, security, contains data for which Ontario does not have the necessary rights to make available as open data).

8. For each dataset listed in the inventory that can be made accessible to the public as open data, ministries and provincial agencies must identify in the inventory, on an ongoing basis, if that dataset will be released as open data.

9. In exceptional cases, ministries and provincial agencies may exclude a dataset from their inventory where the organization is prevented from disclosing the data by law or it is authorized by law to refuse to confirm or deny the existence of data.

5.2 Open Data Publication:

1. All ministry open data must be made available in the Ontario Data Catalogue, which is a central platform for all open data published by ministries and is administered by the Chief Digital and Data Officer. See Appendix B for information on approval authority in ministries for publishing datasets on the Ontario Data Catalogue, including any possible delegations of authority.

2. Provincial agencies must publish all open data following open data requirements. See Appendix B for information on approval authority in provincial agencies for publishing datasets, including any possible delegations of authority.

3. Ministries and provincial agencies must follow the Open Data Guidebook to ensure government data being released as open data meets required criteria.

4. Ministries and provincial agencies should prioritize the publication of datasets frequently requested by the public, collected in support of government priorities or mandated by legislation.

5. All open data must be released in an open format.

6. Open data must be released at no charge to the user and under the Open Government Licence – Ontario (See Appendix A) and/or a similar open licence where appropriate.

7. Ministries and provincial agencies must review and update datasets released as open data periodically to ensure accuracy and timeliness.

8. No datasets released as open data are to be deleted or removed from public access except where a dataset was published in error:

   8.1 In situations where active maintenance and update of a dataset is discontinued, or where any published dataset has to be replaced with a newer or modified version, the dataset description must be updated in the catalogue to reflect the “inactive” status, without restricting public access to the dataset.

   8.2 Where custody and control for a dataset is transferred from one program area to another program area, the new program area must update the dataset description in the Ontario Data Catalogue to reflect this.

9. When legislation mandates the release of data but does not specifically prescribe the format, ministries and provincial agencies should make best efforts to apply open data principles (i.e., listed in Ontario Data Catalogue, in an open format under the Open Government Licence – Ontario and/or a similar open licence where appropriate).

10. In cases where ministries and provincial agencies apply fees to process a request for data, they must review the current practice to assess if releasing it as open data would be a more effective and efficient way of providing the data. This does not apply to freedom of information requests made under the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act application and processing fees or other fees authorized by or under statute.

11. Open data is to be published in the Ontario Data Catalogue in the language it was collected. The dataset title, description, and all accompanying information must be available simultaneously in both English and French.

5.3 Procurement and Contracts:

1. To enable the release of open data, ministries and provincial agencies must, at minimum, include in all new government contracts with vendors, provisions that address the following concepts:

1.1 The government of Ontario will obtain the right to publish procurement contract data as open data. Procurement contract data such as the winning bid for every contract awarded (e.g. vendor name, financial payment information) should be included and published in a timely manner, unless excluded from being made available as open data. Vendors shall agree that financial data of contracts are not considered commercially sensitive and may be released.

1.2 The government of Ontario will obtain the right to publish as open data
original data created or collected as an output of contracts with suppliers,
unless the data should be excluded from being made available as open data.

2. The Treasury Board Secretariat must ensure that open data requirements (e.g., extraction of data in an open format) are built into enterprise architecture, project approval and project assurance processes.

3. All ministries and provincial agencies are accountable to include open data requirements (i.e., extraction of data in an open format) into their architecture review and project approval processes.

4. All data management platforms, applications and solutions acquired or built must have features as a core function that allow for the extraction of content into an open format. This may be accomplished through application programming interfaces (API) in accordance with common best practices presented in the Open Data Guidebook.

6 Open Data Engagement

As part of Ontario’s Open Government Initiative, ministries and provincial agencies should develop plans to promote open data under the guidance of the Ontario Digital Service and their specific communication branches. Ministries and provincial agencies should communicate the strategic value of open data to stakeholders and the public.

1. Work within the Ontario Public Service, Broader Public Sector and with the public and stakeholders to assist in identifying and prioritizing the release of datasets at the community, regional and provincial levels to support social research and planning.

2. Work with industry stakeholders to raise awareness of the economic potential of open data and to prioritize the release of datasets to support economic activities.

3. Leverage educational programs and tools to promote data literacy within their ministries/provincial agencies and with their stakeholders under the guidance of the Ontario Digital Service.

4. Promote the use of government data and digital applications and services with stakeholders.

5. Evaluate the potential of sharing the data internally and/or with relevant external organizations in secure environments in cases where government data cannot be broadly shared as open data.

6. The Ontario Digital Service will coordinate with stakeholders and other levels of government to increase the interoperability and relevance of data. This includes collecting community input, feedback and improving open data quality standards.

7 Definitions

provincial agency — has the following characteristics:

• is established by government through a constituting instrument (under or by statute, Order in Council or regulation);

• is accountable to a minister for fulfilling its legislative obligations, the management of the resources it uses, and its standards for any services it provides;

• the majority of its appointments are made by the government;

• is not organizationally part of a ministry but is part of the Government of Ontario; and,

• has authority and responsibility, granted by the government, to perform an ongoing public function or service that involves adjudicative or regulatory decision-making, operational activity, or an advisory function.

For further clarification refer to Agencies and Appointments Directive.

data — facts, figures and statistics objectively mea­sured according to a standard or scale, such as frequency, volumes or occurrences, but does not include information (as defined by this directive).

dataset — an organized collection of data. The most basic representation of a dataset is data elements presented in tabular form. A dataset may also present information in a variety of non-tabular formats, such as an extensible mark-up language (XML) file, a geospatial data file, or an image file, etc.

data management — the identification and tracking of datasets, metadata, and databases (not to be confused with general records management).

government — the Government of Ontario.

government data — all data created, collected, or managed by ministries and provincial agencies. Government Data includes open data as well as all other datasets.

information — ideas, thoughts, knowledge or memories irrespective of format or medium, which may be represented in manuals, reports and similar work products and may contain data.

inventory — a complete list that describes the data holdings of a program area and the data’s characteristics.

machine-readable — a format in which data (or metadata) can be understood and directly used by a computer. See Open Data Guidebook for a list of Machine-Readable file formats.

metadata — the characteristics of data.

open data — data that is released to the public without charge, under the Open Government Licence – Ontario and/or a similar open licence, through the Ontario Data Catalogue.

open by default — a presumption in favour of disclosure over non-disclosure.

Open Data Guidebook — Ontario’s reference document maintained by the Ontario Digital Service. It contains open data technical standards and recommended data assessment processes.

open format — a set of specifications used to store and transmit digital data that is platform independent, machine-readable, vendor-neutral, standardized where possible, and made available to the public without restrictions that would impede the re-use of that data.

Ontario Data Catalogue — online tool used to disseminate data in accordance with this directive. Can be viewed at Ontario.ca/data.

Open Government Licence – Ontario — a legal agreement that sets out the terms and conditions relating to Ontario’s open data.

open licence — an open licence grants permission to copy, modify, publish, translate, adapt, distribute or otherwise use a work with few or no restrictions. Examples of open licences include the Open Government Licence – Ontario and certain Creative Commons licences.

personal information — is as defined by applicable legislation, such as the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act and the Municipal Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act and as “Personal Health Information” in the Personal Health Information Protection Act.

8 Responsibilities

Chief Digital and Data Officer – responsible for:

• Reporting on ministry and provincial agency compliance with the directive and on the progress of the open government initiative.

• Administering the Ontario Data Catalogue and inventory.

• Regularly reviewing this directive and recommending any changes.

Deputy Ministers and Provincial Agency CEOs (or Chairs if appropriate) – responsible for:

• Adhering to and promoting the principles and requirements in this directive and ensuring that ministry staff do the same.

• Putting in place processes that support the Directive.

• Approving the removal of datasets from the Ontario Data Catalogue.

• Carrying out any assigned tasks in accordance with this Directive.

Cluster Chief Information Officers – responsible for:

• Providing IT support to client ministries in the release of Open Data as required.

• Ensuring that all data management platforms, applications and solutions acquired or built have open data features as a core function, in accordance with this directive.

I&IT project governance committees – responsible for:

• Ensuring that projects meet the requirements outlined in this directive.

Communications divisions – responsible for:

• Developing communications plans for datasets deemed to be higher risk.

Directors – responsible for:

• Ensuring that a risk-based assessment process following the Open Data Guidebook is applied prior to the release of open data.

• Approving the release of open data as set out in this Directive.

• Delegating risk-based approval authority to Managers within the ministry or provincial agency except as restricted in this Directive.

Managers – responsible for:

• Carrying out any delegated authorities and assigned tasks in accordance with this Directive.

• Ensuring staff are aware of the requirements of this Directive.

• Seeking timely direction when there are questions of application.

• Taking appropriate action in the case of non-compliance.

Employees – responsible for:

• Being aware of and following the principles and requirements of this directive.

Appendix A Open Government Licence Ontario

Note: The Open Government Licence – Ontario is based on a template adopted by some Canadian governments at the federal, provincial and municipal levels.

Open Government Licence – Ontario

Using Information under this licence

1. Use of any information indicates your acceptance of the terms below.

2. The information provider grants you a worldwide, royalty-free, perpetual, non-exclusive licence to use the Information, including for commercial purposes, subject to the terms below.

You are free to:

3. Copy, modify, publish, translate, adapt, distribute or otherwise use the Information in any medium, mode or format for any lawful purpose.

You must, where you do any of the above:

4. Acknowledge the source of the information by including any attribution statement specified by the information provider(s) and, where possible, provide a link to this licence.

   If the information provider does not provide a specific attribution statement, or if you are using information from several information providers and multiple attributions are not practical for your product or application, you must use the following attribution statement:

   Contains information licensed under the Open Government Licence – Ontario.

5. The terms of this licence are important, and if you fail to comply with any of them, the rights granted to you under this licence, or any similar licence granted by the Information Provider, will end automatically.

Exemptions

6. This licence does not grant you any right to use:

   a) personal information;

   b) information or records not accessible under the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (Ontario);

   c) third party rights the information provider is not authorized to license;

   d) the names, crests, logos, or other official symbols of the information provider; and

   e) information subject to other intellectual property rights, including patents, trade-marks and official marks.

Non-endorsement

7. This licence does not grant you any right to use the Information in a way that suggests any official status or that the information provider endorses you or your use of the information.

No warranty

8. The information is licensed "as is", and the information provider excludes all representations, warranties, obligations, and liabilities, whether express or implied, to the maximum extent permitted by law.

9. The information provider is not liable for any errors or omissions in the information, and will not under any circumstances be liable for any direct, indirect, special, incidental, consequential, or other loss, injury or damage caused by its use or otherwise arising in connection with this licence or the Information, even if specifically advised of the possibility of such loss, injury or damage.

Governing Law

10. This licence is governed by the laws of the Province of Ontario and the applicable laws of Canada.

11. Legal proceedings related to this licence may only be brought in the courts of Ontario.

Definitions

12. In this licence, the terms below have the following meanings:

"Information"

means information resources or records protected by copyright or other information or records that are offered for use under the terms of this licence.

"Information provider"

means Her Majesty the Queen in right of Ontario.

"Personal information"

has the meaning set out in section 2(1) of Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (Ontario).

"Records"

has the meaning of "record" as set out in the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (Ontario).

"You"

means the natural or legal person, or body of persons corporate or incorporate, acquiring rights under this licence.

Versioning

13. This is version 1.0 of the Open Government Licence – Ontario. The information provider may make changes to the terms of this licence from time to time and issue a new version of the licence. Your use of the information will be governed by the terms of the licence in force as of the date you accessed the information.

Appendix B Approval Authorities

Provision	Approval Level	Delegation
Publication of datasets	Director, program area (ministry or provincial agency)	Manager
Removal of datasets	Deputy Minister	No delegation

Delegation must be documented