The Federal Bureau of Investigation's Pre-Acquisition Planning for
and Controls Over the Sentinel Case Management System

Audit Report 06-14
March 2006
Office of the Inspector General

The Global Justice XML Data Reference Model (GJXDM) is an Extensible Markup Language (XML) standard designed specifically for criminal justice information exchanges, providing law enforcement, public safety agencies, prosecutors, public defenders, and the judicial branch with a tool to effectively share data and information in a timely manner. The GJXDM removes the burden from agencies to independently create exchange standards, and because of its ability to cover a variety of sources, there is more flexibility to deal with unique agency requirements and changes. Through the use of a common vocabulary that is understood system to system, GJXDM enables access from multiple sources and reuse in multiple applications. The National Information Exchange Model (NIEM) is an “umbrella” model that synchronizes domain-specific models such as GJXDM. According to a Department of Justice system architect, the NIEM project vision is to develop a national enterprise-wide framework to facilitate information sharing across all levels of government in support of justice, public safety, intelligence, and homeland security thereby improving America's security, while respecting the privacy rights of citizens and the autonomy of external agencies and domains. The GJXDM and NIEM models can make information exchange substantially more efficient by serving as guidance on how to document information. The models provide a standardized language where everyone understands what each term means as well as provide a vocabulary where people would be more likely to choose the same terms to describe the same thing. Upon that foundation, more specific standards are created for more specific kinds of information sharing, particularly for Sentinel and the Federal Investigative Case Management System (FICMS). The various ways in which a FICMS system will exchange information must be identified and documented, and then exchange standards are built for each interface using GJXDM and NIEM. These exchange standards will define a significant portion of what FICMS is, in that compliance with these standards will be a necessary attribute of any FICMS system. In turn, these standards will be incorporated back into GJXDM and NIEM for reuse in other kinds of systems as appropriate. The Department created the GJXDM by gathering approximately 16,000 data elements from 35 data dictionaries comprised of Department agencies as well as various local and state government sources. Currently, GJXDM consists of a defined and organized vocabulary of 2,754 reusable components.