The wider problem with the DUNS number, especially as far as its use within government, is that it is a proprietary identifier, which makes it unsuitable for us

The wider problem with the DUNS number, especially as far as its use within government, is that it is a proprietary identifier, which makes it unsuitable for use in a public domain context, especially as far as combining with other data (e.g. combining data from different federal agencies) or in an open data context. Having said that the UK government is now using it in procurement just as the US government is now starting to understand the underlying problems and having second thoughts about its use. See http://blog.opencorporates.com/2012/07/24/are-duns-numbers-the-crack-cocaine-of-id-systems-and-is-the-uk-the-latest-addict/ http://blog.opencorporates.com/2012/07/24/are-duns-numbers-t... for more details