NIST Big Data Working Group (NBD-WG) Charter

Document: NBD-WG M0001
August 21, 2013

CHARTER for
NIST Big Data Working Group (NBD-WG)

Background

NIST is leading the development of a Big Data Technology Roadmap. This roadmap will define and prioritize requirements for interoperability, portability, reusability, and extensibility for big data usage, analytic techniques and technology infrastructure in order to support secure and effective adoption of Big Data. To help develop the ideas in the Big Data Technology Roadmap, NIST is creating the Public Working Group for Big Data.

Scope

The focus of the NIST Big Data Public Working Group (NBD-PWG) is to form a community of interest from industry, academia, and government, with the goal of developing a consensus definitions, taxonomies, reference architectures, and technology roadmaps.  The aim is to create vendor-neutral, technology and infrastructure agnostic deliverables to enable Big Data stakeholders to pick-and-choose best analytics tools for their processing and visualization requirements on the most suitable computing platforms and clusters while allowing value-added from Big Data service providers and flow of data between the stakeholders in a cohesive and secure manner.  

Deliverables

1. Produce a working draft for Big Data Definitions
2. Produce a working draft for Big Data Taxonomies 
3. Produce a working draft for Big Data Requirements  
4. Produce a working draft for Big Data Secure and Privacy Requirements
5. Produce a working draft for Big Data Reference Architectures
6. Produce a working draft for Big Data Secure and Privacy Reference Architectures
7. Produce a working draft for Big Data Technology Roadmap

Target Date 

The goal for completion of INITIAL DRAFTs is Friday, September 27, 2013.  Further milestones will be developed once the WG has initiated its regular meetings.

Co-Conveners

Wo Chang, NIST
Robert Marcus, ET-Strategies
Chaitanya Baru, UC San Diego

Subgroups and Descriptions

• Definitions and Taxonomies – Survey and study current and future best practices of Big Data; develop concise definitions using factual information, characteristic description, and/or potential usage scenario; develop taxonomies by identifying clear boundaries between actors, roles, activities, components and subcomponents in their respective environments. 
• Requirements – Collect and organize use cases, general and specified focus from different application domains; identify and document needed requirements with sample scenarios.
• Security and Privacy – Gather and analyze security and privacy related requirements from all Big Data stakeholders; develop security and privacy requirements that supplement the general Requirements of Big Data. 
• Reference Architecture – Gather and study available Big Data architectures from all stakeholders that meet the Big Data taxonomies model; develop Big Data reference architecture that can satisfy various use cases from diversified application domains. 
• Technology Roadmap – Gather input from NBD subgroups and study the taxonomies for the actors’ roles and responsibility, use cases and requirements, and secure reference architecture; perform gap analysis and produce vision and recommendations.

Subgroups Co-Chairs

• Definitions and Taxonomies: *Nancy Grady (SAIC), Natasha Balac (SDSC), Eugene Luster (R2AD)
• Requirements: *Geoffrey Fox (U. of Indiana), Joe  Paiva (VA), Tsegereda Beyene (Cisco)
• Security and Privacy: *Arnab Roy (CSA, Fujitsu), Nancy Landreville (U. of MD), Akhil Manchanda (GE)
• Reference Architecture: *Orit Levin (Microsoft), James Ketner (AT&T), Don Krapohl (Augmented Intelligence)
• Technology Roadmap: *Carl Buffington (USDA), Dan McClary (Oracle), David Boyd (Data Tactic)

Formation of the Subgroup:  There will be one Lead Co-Chair, two Co-Chairs:

• Lead Co-Chair - sends meeting agenda with consensus from other Co-Chairs, calls for meeting, conducts meeting, and acts as the main point of contact for the subgroup
• 2 Co-Chairs - help create approach to meet NBD-WG needs and carryout subgroup tasks.

Meeting Frequency

It is anticipated that subgroups will meet by telecon weekly 2-hour Mondays to Fridays from 11:00AM – 1:00PM EDT while NBD-WG will meet every other three week Wednesdays from 1300 -1500ET.  The order for subgroup meeting is:

• Mondays: Definitions and Taxonomies
• Tuesday: Requirements
• Wednesdays: Security and Privacy
• Thursdays: Reference Architecture
• Fridays: Technology Roadmap

Membership

Participation in the WG and Subgroups are open to all interested parties.  There are no membership fees.

Coordination/Interaction

The NIST Big Data Working Group will function in close coordination with other big data related standards and best practices from industry, academia, and government.

Standing Rules

All information exchanged within the WG will be non-proprietary.
All information exchanged within the WG will contain non-PII materials.
WG members should assume that all materials exchanged will be made public.
Documents will be publicly accessible on the NIST Big Data Portal.

Outreach

WG results will be available to all stakeholders in the commercial, academic, and government sectors.