The United Nations Global Pulse is an initiative of the United Nations that attempts to "bring real-time monitoring and prediction to development and aid programs.
[2] The website lists the following three objectives of the initiative:[1] The data sources that Global Pulse has investigated include:[1] Global Pulse runs innovation programmes in which it partners with organizations that have access to relevant sources of big data, data analytics technologies, and data science expertise, as well as with UN agency and government ministry "problem owners" grappling with challenges that could benefit from new insights and real-time measurement tools, to discover, build and test high-potential applications of big data.
Its innovation programmes focus on sectors such as food security, agriculture, employment, infectious disease, urbanization, and disaster response, as well as cross-cutting issues such as M&E and privacy protection.
[2] The United Nations Global Pulse has been discussed repeatedly in The Guardian[4][5][6] and Foreign Policy.
[7][8] It has also received in-depth coverage in The New York Times,[2] O'Reilly Media,[3] and United Nations Radio.