[Talk-in] OSM and New Indian Geospatial Guidelines

Tue Aug 16 20:45:32 UTC 2022

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> *Before the new geospatial guidelines:*1.  Exactly how legally
> problematic was OSM in India?

>From my knowledge, there was generally two issues:
- Decades old regulations on ground surveying as a technical
skilled activity that required security clearance and a license for
companies involved in this work. Unclear how it applied to volunteers
making a map of their neighbourhood with a gps or tracing on satellite
imagery.
- Maps published in India had to have the international boundary as per
Survey of India boundaries. Indian OSM community put up
http://openstreetmap.in that displayed borders as per SOI and document how
data users can comply
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/India/Boundaries/National_borders

> *Now for the current status with the new geospatial guidelines:*1. Do you
> think the Indian Govt will strictly enforce the guidelines this time
> around?

>From reading the regulations [1][2] and understanding its spirit to
liberalize mapping and promote access to geospatial data, highly doubt OSM
will be a target for the govt to strictly comply. Reasons being the
following text in the published regulations:

There has been immense progress over the years in technology for capture of
> geospatial data through ground-based survey techniques, photogrammetry
> using manned/unmanned aerial vehicles, terrestrial vehicle mounted Mobile
> Mapping System, LIDAR, RADAR Interferometry, satellite-based remote
> sensing, mobile phone sensors and other techniques.

This list is mostly composed of high precision data collection that has a
high commercial value, while satellite based and phone sensors are really
the most widely accessible and least accurate, and the ones primarily used
in the context of crowdsourced OSM data collection.

The availability of data and modern mapping technologies to Indian
> companies is also crucial for achieving India's policy aim of Atmanirbhar
> Bharat and the vision for a five trillion-dollar economy. India presently
> relies heavily on foreign resources for mapping technologies and services.

In this context OSM is probably the most prized resource for Indian
companies to take advantage of since it makes available global open map
data and supporting open software for free that enables an Indian company
to compete in a foreign market. Good example is Mapbox that has built a
global map platform using OSM data and there's no reason an Indian company
could not do the same. Not having OSM in India would hurt India more than
anyone else.

With the advent of publicly available geospatial services, a lot of
> Geospatial Data that used to be in restricted zone are freely and commonly
> available now and some of the policies/guidelines that used to regulate
> such information have been rendered obsolete and redundant. What is readily
> available globally does not need to be regulated.

In this spirit it is senseless to impose a restriction on technology that
the rest of the world has without restriction. Good example is how
access to high resolution satellite imagery of India was restricted within
India, but is available without restriction to anyone else in the world
from imagery companies like Maxar. It would make no sense to restrict use
of OSM within India while the rest of the world can do as they please and
foreigners can map India from high resolution satellite imagery that is
already available.

Self-certification will be used to convey adherence to these guidelines.

This is once again in the spirit of liberalization and does not seem to
indicate a strict enforcement unless a good reason to do so

 (a) There shall be a negative list of sensitive attributes that would
> require regulation before anyone can acquire and/or use such attribute
> data. DST will notify this list on its website along with stipulated
> regulations after consultation with departments concerned. (b) The negative
> lists mentioned above will be specific to very sensitive attributes and
> care would be taken so as to minimize restrictions in order to boost the
> Ease of Doing Business. The list may be regularly updated as required.

 --

*Since the security Installations/Features and secured facilities mentioned
> above are quite generic, there may be instances where some of the
> attributes restricted here in case of a particular facility(ies) are
> allowed by the Ministry/Department concerned as owner of those facilities
> and made available on the website of their organization, displayed through
> public notices/signages outside their compounds or other-wise shared by
> them for public dissemination. In such cases, the stipulated regulations as
> mentioned above shall stand relaxed for those specific cases to the extent
> allowed by the owner of such facilities.

This is perhaps the one section to be concerned about since it deals with
national security. The published negative list [3] makes sense and in most
cases also not something an ordinary citizen would map on OSM, so the risk
is naturally quite low, but maybe a good idea to do some kind of audit.

iv. (a) For the purposes of these guidelines, the threshold value for:
> 1. On-site spatial accuracy shall be one meter for horizontal or
> Planimetry and three meters for vertical or Elevation.
> 2. Gravity anomaly shall be 1 milli-gal.
> 3. Vertical accuracy of Bathymetric data in Territorial Waters shall be 10
> meters for up to 500 meters from the shore-line and 100 meters beyond that.

Maps/Geospatial Data of spatial accuracy/value finer than the threshold
> value can only be created and/or owned by Indian Entities and must be
> stored and processed in India.

This section should likely be viewed in the context of high precision data
collection instruments like LiDAR and vehicle mounted Mobile Mapping
System. For OSM, a phone GPS is the more relevant measurement instrument
and within this threshold. The restriction makes no sense on creating data
from satellite imagery since imagery can have unknown ground offset and
vector geometries on OSM are unlikely to have an on ground accuracy finer
than 1m unless by chance. Just because the coordinate stored in the
database has high precision, does not mean it's accurate on the ground.

> The Government of India shall encourage crowd sourcing efforts to build
> Maps by allocating public funds towards these efforts as appropriate.

This is great, OSM has a good head start that will probably be very
valuable to build on top off :)

We do need a proper legal review and more documentation on how the
regulations apply to OSM data use in India, but am not seeing anything in
the regulations to be alarmed about. Overall it looks like a great step
forward and more supportive of projects like OSM and recognize the value of
crowdsourcing and access to spatial data for the economy.

There are several sections in the draft National geospatial policy[2] that
talks about the creation of  a Geospatial Data Promotion and Development
Committee [GDPDC] composed of government and private stakeholders to audit,
review and enforce the geospatial data regulations. We're missing the big
picture if we are looking at the regulation just in the context of OSM,
which is a very small part of the much larger geospatial industry that
deals with high precision surveys and future technologies like HD lane
mapping for autonomous vehicles.

Maintaining good relationships with nodal agencies like NRSC/SoI above all
will ensure that the OSM community in considered an important stakeholder
in the geospatial landscape of the country.

[1]
https://dst.gov.in/sites/default/files/Final%20Approved%20Guidelines%20on%20Geospatial%20Data.pdf
[2] https://dst.gov.in/sites/default/files/Draft%20NGP%2C%202021.pdf
[3]
https://dst.gov.in/sites/default/files/List%20of%20Negative%20Attributes.pdf

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