Crossflo Systems, Inc., an innovative provider of data-sharing solutions, has released its newly enhanced CDX family of data-exchange products that fully support the FBI's N-DEx program. The new CDX features include a graphical data mapping, conversion, and integration capability specifically designed for conformance with N-DEx. The CDX software family spans from embedded OEM adapters for software manufacturers including RMS, CAD, and CMS, to enterprise class server software to enable data exchange between any number of unique systems using virtually any XML schema as the exchange standard. Common exchange schemas in the public sector include N-DEx, NIEM, GJXDM, EDXL, and CAP.

"With Crossflo's success in efficiently mapping data and implementing data exchanges for state and local law enforcement agencies, court systems, as well as healthcare organizations, we were able to transfer our expertise into a tool that agencies can use to map their data to N-DEx in conformance with all current standards," stated Mike Berman, senior vice president of Sales and Marketing at Crossflo. "CDX now fully leverages the use of LEX/N-DEx as well as NIEM schema structures including associations, substitution groups, and the XSD:ANY construct. These capabilities are critical in order to produce conforming and valid XML for NIEM and other new XML standards."

The FBI describes N-DEx as a criminal justice information sharing system that will provide nationwide connectivity to disparate local, state, tribal, and federal systems for the exchange of information. N-DEx will provide law enforcement agencies with a powerful new investigative tool to search, link, analyze, and share information (for example, incident and case reports) on a national basis to a degree never before possible. N-DEx will primarily benefit local law enforcement in their role as the first line of defense against crime and terrorism. Contessa, the FBI's N-DEx data validation engine, tested the XML output of CDX and reported successful results.

All information shared through N-DEx originates from data supplied by data sources from numerous local, state, tribal and federal systems such as incident reports, arrest reports, case files, booking reports, incarceration records, and criminal histories. These records contain information about entities (e.g., people, locations, dates, and items such as weapons and vehicles) and may specify relationships among the entities they contain (e.g., person lives at address or owns vehicle). Because the legacy systems used by agencies vary in their terminology and data constructs, CDX provides the user with a user-friendly capability to associate (map) data to the desired XML standard, N-DEx in this case. As different data assets are mapped to the standard, an exchange is enabled that maintains the "context" of the data. Strong security measures are employed to enable the data "owner" to control with whom their data is exchanged, under what circumstances, and how often.