Quality aspects of volunteered geographic information in crisis situations

Abstract

The escalation of disasters around the world has led to an increase in applied research in the service of developing technologies that support decision-making processes in crisis situations. Effective disaster management depends on the availability of up-to-date and accurate data, and the advent of Volunteered Geographic Information (VGI) has opened up opportunities for near-real-time data collection. VGI is produced by different stakeholders using different technologies and tools, each providing data with different levels of granularity and accuracy. In addition, the stakeholders themselves have a wide range of quality assessment methods and decision-making approaches, making it difficult to interpret their contributions. This review therefore aims to closely examine the research literature in the field of VGI in the context of disaster management, focusing on the quality dimensions of VGI that encompass both quality assurance and assessment aspects.