ESRA 2025 Preliminary Program
All time references are in CEST
New developments in research data infrastructures 2 |
| Session Organiser |
Dr Daniel Fuß (Leibniz Institute for Educational Trajectories (LIfBi))
|
| Time | Wednesday 16 July, 13:45 - 15:00 |
| Room |
Ruppert 114 |
The session is intended to gain an insight into current developments in regard to the provision of (a) research data and (b) innovative support services for data users. It points to the growing importance of research data management and the important role of data infrastructures to support researchers in an increasingly complex landscape with diverse data sources and data formats.
First starting point is the system of accredited Research Data Centers (RDC) in Germany. These RDCs were created to enable access to restricted research data, in particular data relating to individuals, households or companies. Such sensitive data require specific safeguards for provision and use. More than 40 RDCs act as a decentralized network of research data infrastructure providers for national and international scientists. They serve as a kind of “data trustee” whose quality assurance in terms of data editing, management, documentation, and dissemination is ensured by a joint accreditation and monitoring process with the German Data Forum (RatSWD).
The second starting point is the wide range of services that have been implemented as part of the Consortium for the Social, Behavioral, Educational and Economic Sciences (KonsortSWD) within the National Research Data Infrastructure (NFDI) in order to exploit new data sources and to further improve access to and use of data for empirical analyses. Examples include QualidataNet as a central platform for the secondary use of qualitative data resources, RDCnet as a planned network of interconnected onsite guest researcher workstations for improved access to highly sensitive information and Forum4MICA as an online place for the public exchange of information on all aspects of research data and research data management.
Based on selected contributions, the session will highlight opportunities for accessing relevant research data sources and related services with a discussion of challenges in their provision and gaps that still exist.
Keywords: Research Data Center, Data Access, Sensitive Data, Data User Services, Quality Assurance, Secondary Data Supply
Papers
Enabling cross-border research with sensitive data via the International Data Access Network (IDAN)
Ms Beate Lichtwardt (UKDS)
Mrs Dana Müller (IAB)
Dr Heike Wirth (GESIS) - Presenting Author
Researchers are increasingly interested in using sensitive data across borders for international comparative research. Currently, access to sensitive data is often restricted nationally, let alone internationally. Often, researchers can access sensitive data only nationally and via booking a Research Data Center’s Safe Room. However, due to their high level of detail and population coverage (e.g. registry data), sensitive data form an essential resource for research of social and political importance.
The International Data Access Network (IDAN), launched in 2018, is a collaboration between several Research Data Centers (RDCs) from France, Germany and the UK to facilitate the use of secure access data for research by providing reciprocal Safe Room Remote Desktop Access. The network is a) currently expanding and b) discussing ways to enable cross-border research with similar data from different data providers within the same Secure Environment.
Our presentation will give an overview of how IDAN works, and outline our plans to improve cross-border access to sensitive data. Further, we will discuss initial steps to overcome legal and technical barriers currently hindering researchers to combine sensitive data across countries for comparative research. Finally, we will highlight the benefits for researchers using these data.
Forum4MICA - Online Discussion Forum on Research Data in the Social, Behavioral, Educational and Economic Sciences
Dr Martina Baumann (Leibniz Institute for Educational Trajectories) - Presenting Author
Dr Daniel Fuß (Leibniz Institute for Educational Trajectories)
The growing range of reusable data resources in the social, behavioural, educational and economic sciences opens up a broad spectrum of potential for empirical research. The expansion of research data infrastructures is accompanied by an increasing need for information on the part of the data users. A sound understanding of complex data forms the base for high-quality research. Accordingly, support from the data providers and a close dialogue with the scientific community are of key importance. In addition to the quality of this service, its transparency, flexibility and sustainability play a crucial role.
Forum4MICA – Making Information Commonly Available – is an online information and discussion platform for questions relating to reusable data resources and the handling of this data. The implementation of a modern forum solution offers new opportunities for exchange and for networking that go far beyond traditional bilateral question-and-answer interactions. Furthermore, the forum functions as a continuously growing knowledge archive in which contributions are openly searchable and permanently available. The Forum4MICA is an attempt to establish a general, low-threshold, well-structured service for both users and providers of research data infrastructures as a supplement to conventional data documentation.
Since its launch in February 2023, 18 relevant research data centres and research data management projects have committed to actively participate in the forum as experts. Forum4MICA currently has 450 registered users and over 600 user-driven articles. The aim is to successively expand this participation and thus increase the visibility of research data infrastructures within the community.
The presentation will share our experiences gained so far in setting up the forum, discuss the challenges and the applicability in other scientific fields and outline further steps. For more information see https://forum.lifbi.de/.
Enhancing Research Data Management for Unstructured Data: Services from BERD@NFDI
Dr Ulrich Krieger (Mannheim University Library) - Presenting Author
The increasing complexity of research data sources and formats demands innovative
solutions in research data management. This session explores recent advancements in
working with unstructured data coming out of the BERD@NFDI consortium.
BERD@NFDI as part of the German National Research Data Initiative (NFDI), provides
training, tools, and data for social scientists working with text, audio, and video data. Key
services include the BERD Academy, which offers targeted training for handling unstructured
data, and the BERD Data Portal, which enables access to curated datasets. The BERD
Marketplace connects researchers and companies, fostering collaboration between
academia and industry. In addition, BERD@NFDI provides legal assistance for researchers
through virtual assistants and a helpdesk, and an advanced OCR solution designed for
digitizing historical business records, transforming scanned documents into
machine-readable formats.
In this presentation, we will demonstrate how these services empower researchers to
navigate the challenges of unstructured data, ensuring robust and reproducible results
across diverse research domains.
RDCnet - Connecting secure workplaces
Mr Neill Murray (DIW Berlin) - Presenting Author
The RDCnet aims to facilitate access to sensitive research data by fostering collaborations between Research Data Centers (RDCs) and enabling the mutual use of their secure workstations. Rather than requiring researchers to travel to a specific data-providing RDC to analyze their data on-site, RDCnet offers a decentralized network of secure workstations at various partner locations, providing researchers with greater flexibility. At its core, RDCnet is based on the idea that each participating institution provides a secure workstation and, optionally, remote access to their research data while being interconnected with all other institutions in the network. This approach ensures that data providers maintain full control over who can access their data and where, while enabling researchers to work with sensitive data from any secure workstation within the RDCnet. To ensure the required levels of data protection, all secure workstations must be maintained and configured according to standardized security criteria, developed collaboratively with eight RDCs in Germany. This guarantees that sensitive data is processed exclusively within strictly controlled environments. To realize RDCnet, we provide essential services and support to facilitate multilateral collaboration. These include a unified cooperation agreement with clear organizational and technical guidelines, a shared platform for booking secure workstations, and technical support for implementing secure work environments and remote access systems. By lowering access barriers, RDCnet reduces costs for researchers working with sensitive data while simultaneously improving access possibilities for data providers. This approach not only ensures efficient and secure data use but also enhances the visibility of research data, ultimately increasing the number of potential users.
