Data Governance Matters

I confess. I am absolutely obsessed with the showtime television show Dexter, which stars Michael C. Hall as the Miami Beach police blood splatter expert who just happens to also be a serial killer with a veeeery interesting set of rituals.

The show has a lot of cool data-related scenes; that guy knows how to work a database to research his victims. Also, on the show, it’s clear that his department’s data access controls are lacking. But it’s the character development that’s so arresting - plus the great outdoor shots of Miami.

So this week I’m working not too many miles from those locations. I look out the window at the palm trees and can imagine myself in one of the show’s plot lines. Where is the killer hiding? I want to know.

In real life, however, the killer is in the building with me, lodged inside a database. Killer data - bad or missing information that has the capacity to kill a business, an industry, or even an economy. 

Aahh, the work of we investigators who search it out, put in controls to avert crises, and implement governance to make sure that all the citizens of this real-life world play according to the rules. I like this work.

Now if only it had a sexy soundtrack and better set designers…