VIDEO | Data4Good Peace, Justice & Strong Institutions Award Winner: OpenCorporates

(Europe) OpenCorporates has won CDO Magazine’s Inaugural 2022 Data4Good Award in the Peace, Justice & Strong Institutions category. In a video interview with Jim Halcomb, Head of Product Management at EDM Council, Rebecca Lee, OpenCorporates Chief Impact Officer, speaks about the organization's efforts to drive corporate transparency, its partnerships, revenue, and its approach to leveraging data to deter corporate wrongdoings.

Lee states that OpenCorporates’ purpose is to change the dynamics of corporate transparency by leveraging disparate data, collecting public records from official company registers globally, and making them openly available in one place. The data includes information about companies and who controls and benefits from them.

She explains that the information is critical for creating a trusted business environment and is used by journalists, civil society, anti-corruption investigators, and anti-financial crime professionals. OpenCorporates also provides data products at scale for free to journalists, academics, charities, and law enforcement.

Lee cites the example of how data provided by OpenCorporates enabled COVID investigations and identified fraudulent COVID relief system claims. She points out that shining light on fraudulent companies helps partner organizations like Trace Finance, which uses data to bring transparency to the billions of dollars that finance tropical deforestation.

Regarding the organization’s business model, Lee says that the revenue generated from paying clients is channeled into efforts to make more data openly available. She adds that data stewardship is in OpenCorporates’ DNA.

Sharing her view on data’s future uses for social causes, Lee says there is a revolution in the open data community where organizations disrupt the status quo by making data available. She adds that it is done transparently to address major societal problems such as economic and environmental crimes, slavery, and corruption.

In conclusion, Lee says that CDO Magazine’s inaugural Data4Good Award in the Peace, Justice & Strong Institutions category is as much for OpenCorporates as it is for its partners.

CDO Magazine appreciates Rebecca Lee for sharing her insights and data success stories with our global community.