NIEM

National Information Exchange Model. The cross-agency XML model the US federal government has maintained since 2005.

Definition

NIEM (National Information Exchange Model) is a modelling framework and a set of XML schemas maintained by the US federal government to standardise information exchange between agencies. It covers justice, security, immigration, health, defence, transportation and emergency domains. NIEM provides a common vocabulary, Information Exchange Package Documentations (IEPDs) and a formal extension process.

Origin

NIEM was launched in February 2005 by the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Justice, as an extension of the Global Justice XML Data Model (GJXDM, 2003). It is today hosted by the NIEM Management Office and used by 16 reference domains. Version 5.0 shipped in 2020, NIEM 6.0 in 2024.

Example in context

A NIEM Justice IEPD might describe the exchange of an arrest report between a municipal police force and the federal prosecutor's office: it combines the NIEM Core namespace (Person, Address, ContactInformation), the Justice namespace (Arrest, Charge, CourtCase) and local extensions. Everything is generated as W3C XSD schemas, which makes NIEM directly consumable by the same tools as UBL or Cross Industry Invoice.

Related terms

• W3C XML Schema — the schema language NIEM is built on.
• HIPAA — US healthcare framework, adjacent but distinct from NIEM.
• TR3 — HIPAA guide derived from a similar model.