Role of Statistical Data and Metadata eXchange in Combating Corruption

Corruption is a form of dishonesty or a criminal offense undertaken by a person or organization entrusted with a position of authority, to acquire illicit benefits or abuse power for personal gain. It is one of the basic problems in different societies in a way that is destructive for the economy, politics, society, and environment. Corruption disrupts governance and severely weakens the social structure of society, trust, confidence, and the rule of law. The opposite of corruption is transparency. The main goal of transparency is to fight corruption and to hold the country's officials responsible and accountable. Additionally, in terms of economic and informational transparency, economic and commercial activities should be predictable, and the anonymized microdata of the country's governing bodies should be promptly provided to the society in an appropriate structure and with acceptable quality as a public good in the context of open data. The concept of information transparency means that there is easy and free access to statistical information and high-quality microdata in a timely and punctuality format for everyone. Transparency allows individuals and organizations to have full access to correct and accurate information they need. This enables them to check the performance of institutions and organizations and ensure that the decisions and executive actions of the rulers of the country are fair, accurate, and carried out correctly. The transparency infrastructure includes quality data, a culture and commitment to data and metadata exchange, expertise in data collation, data matching, record linkage, and proper analysis of aggregated data.