Open data platform provider and cloud software company, Socrata, is getting a strategic investment from In-Q-Tel (IQT), the investment firm that makes strategic investments to support the intelligence community. The investment is notable given Socrata’s open data services, and recent revelations about the full extent of the domestic and international surveillance dragnet. CivSource has previously reported on the deployment of the company’s platform to provide government data to the public in several cities and states.
Under the agreement, IQT will make a strategic investment in Socrata, and the two entities will work together to further develop Socrata’s data consumerization platform for internal business analysts in data-rich organizations. Users of Socrata’s technologies can transform raw data from multiple sources into more sophisticated and useful resources, such as apps, reports, maps, visualizations, dashboards and application programming interfaces (APIs).
The investment raises some questions about the apps created through Socrata, and whether this relationship means that those apps will come ready with surveillance backdoors.
Founded in 2007, Socrata has raised $25 million to date. In June, it closed an $18 million Series B round of financing, led by OpenView Venture Partners with participation from existing investors, Frazier Technology Ventures and Morgenthaler Ventures.