Education

J. D. University of Wisconsin

Research interests

Professor Onsrud’s research focuses on the analysis of legal, ethical, and institutional issues affecting the creation and use of digital databases and the assessment of the social impacts of spatial technologies. He is past president and current interim Executive Director of the Global Spatial Data Infrastructure Association (GSDI), past-president of the University Consortium for Geographic Information Science (UCGIS), and past Chair of the U.S. National Committee (USNC) on Data for Science and Technology (CODATA) of the National Research Council. He recently chaired a U.S. National Research Council Study on the Licensing of Spatial Data and Services and is a lifetime National Associate of the U.S. National Academies of Sciences. He currently chairs also the Socieconomic Data and Applications Center (SEDAC) Working Group, a Distributed Active Archive Center (DAAC) in the Earth Observing System Data and Information System (EOSDIS) located at CIESIN, Columbia University. He is a licensed engineer, land surveyor and attorney. Current and past research projects have been funded by the National Science Foundation, the Institute of Museums and Libraries, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, the Federal Geographic Data Committee, and the U.S. Department of Education. He teaches courses in Information Systems Law, Information Ethics, Cadastral and Land Information Systems, and Research Ethics.

Publications

• (sample) Onsrud, Harlan, Gilberto Camara, James Campbell, and Narindi Sharad Chakravarthy. "Public Commons of Geographic Data: Research and Development Challenges." In Geographic Information Science, edited by Max J. Egenhofer, Christian Freska, and Harvey J. Miller, 223–38. Berlin: Springer-Verlag, 2004. Lecture Notes in Computer Science #3234 [preprint]
• Onsrud, H., B. Poore, R. Rugg, R. Taupier, and L. Wiggins, 2004, The Future of the Spatial Information Infrastructure. In McMaster, Robert B. and E. Lynn Usery, (Eds.), A Research Agenda for Geographic Information Science (Boca Raton: CRC Press), 225-255 [preprint]
• Onsrud, H.J., 2004, Geographic Information Legal Issues, Encyclopedia of Life Support Systems(EOLSS), Developed under the auspices of the UNESCO, EOLSS Publishers, Oxford, UK, http://www.eolss.net [preprint]
• Committee on Licensing Geographic Data and Services, 2004, Licensing Geographic Data and Services (Washington D.C: National Academies Press) http://books.nap.edu/catalog/11079.html
• Onsrud, Harlan, 2004, Overview of Open-Access and Public-Commons Initiatives in the United States, In Esanu, J. and P. Uhlir, (Eds.), Open Access and the Public Domain in Digital Data and Information for Science: Proceedings of an International Symposium (Washington D.C: National Academies Press), 114-118 http://books.nap.edu/catalog/11030.html
• Van Loenen B., Onsrud H.J., 2004, Geographic Data for Academic Research: Assessing Access Policies. Cartography and Geographic Information Science 31(1): 3-17. [preprint]
• Onsrud, H.J., 2003, Access to Geographic Information: Openness versus Security. In Cutter, S., D. Richardson and T. Wilbanks (Eds.), Geographic Dimensions of Terrorism (Routledge). 207-213 [preprint]
• Onsrud, Harlan, 2003, Emerging Models for Maintaining Scientific Data in the Public Domain, In Esanu, J. and P. Uhlir, (Eds.), The Role of Scientific and Technical Data and Information in the Public Domain (Washington D.C: National Academies Press), 180-186 http://books.nap.edu/catalog/10785.html
• Maurer, S., P.B. Hugenholtz, and H. Onsrud, 2001, Europe\'s Database Experiment, Science, 294: 789-790, 26 Oct 2001.
• Onsrud, H.J., 2000, Loss of Legal Access to Geographic Information: Measuring Losses or Developing Responses? In Janelle, D.G. and D. Hodge (Eds.), Information, Place and Cyberspace: Issues in Accessibility (Berlin and Heidelberg: Springer-Verlag) [preprint]

[Edit my profile]