Meet a TReNDS’ Expert: Tom Orrell

Written by TReNDS Staff

In the Meet TReNDS series, we introduce you to TReNDS' experts, staff, and friends–leading individuals and organizations in the broader data for development community.

Meet...

TReNDS’ expert Tom Orrell, Founder and Managing Director of DataReady

About TOM

Tom is an advocate and non-practicing barrister. He founded DataReady in 2018, having identified a need for less technical and more governance-oriented services in the sustainable development and humanitarian sectors. Tom’s expertise lies in the links between digital and data policy, sustainable development and human rights. Tom has over 14 years of experience working for UN agencies in Ethiopia and Togo, tech-oriented civil society and social purposes companies, and London-based law firms specialising in human rights law. Tom has a BA in International Relations from Keele University and was Called to the Bar of England and Wales in 2011.

Q&A

In your career, what area of data for development have you primarily focused on?
Data governance in the sustainable development and humanitarian sectors.

What emerging area of data for development are you most eager to tackle in your own work?
The intersection between digital and data innovation, and human rights and good governance. Around the world, policymakers are engaged in a balancing act between the benefits of data use, individuals’ rights, and ethical considerations. In many parts of the world, principles and laws informed by the public and social conventions are desperately needed to inform this balancing act to ensure that the data revolution is grounded in human rights and data ethics.

What emerging area of data for development are you most eager to see addressed by the community at large?
The fact that the ‘data revolution for sustainable development’ can only ultimately be successful and sustainable if it is grounded in human rights and good governance principles.

What is the most interesting use of data you’ve seen?
It’s an old example, but I think the decision in 1983 to make GPS data available to the public and reusable commercially is perhaps one of the most transformative examples of digital data use globally.

What do you think will be the primary focus areas for data for development this decade and how will Covid-19 impact this?

The need to find ways of ensuring data is used to empower rather than exploit data subjects; bringing to the fore concepts of data equity, data justice and data accountability. COVID-19 has had an incredible impact in raising the profile of the power of digital tools in the general public and the dangers of surveillance and exploitation linked to them.

What are you most eager to engage in with TReNDS?

TReNDS' governance work.

 
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