Accessibility

Develop infrastructure and services to facilitate the accessibility of research data and other research-relevant digital objects from public funding within and across scientific domains and disciplines. 

To facilitate the accessibility of research data and other digital objects, governments and funding agencies should prioritise the development of sustainable, discipline-based, and FAIR-compliant infrastructures. Adequate funding should support open access repositories within public institutions and structured data repositories managed by funding bodies.

Key implementation options include:

• Invest in repositories, cloud services, and resources for data storage and access, with particular focus on international collaboration for discipline-specific repositories.

• Develop frameworks for restricted access to sensitive data in secure data centers, ensuring compliance with ethical and legal requirements.

• Enable results-only access without transferring sensitive datasets, safeguarding privacy.

• Define graded access levels for raw data (from fully open to restricted) while ensuring the publication of minimal descriptive metadata to enhance dataset discoverability.

• Establish clear protocols for handling personal data that cannot be openly shared, promoting responsible and accessible data use.

Challenges for implementaiton include:

• Developing and maintaining reliable, FAIR-compliant repositories and infrastructures requires significant financial investment and long-term funding commitments, which are often inconsistent or insufficient.

• Different scientific disciplines have varied requirements for data storage, access, and metadata standards, making it challenging to develop interoperable, cross-disciplinary infrastructures.

• Implementing robust protocols for restricted access, data anonymisation, and "data visiting" architectures involves navigating complex ethical, legal, and technical issues, especially for sensitive data