Security Meets Open Science. An Integrated Self-Assessment Tool for Responsible Research Data Management.

"Security Meets Open Science. An Integrated Self-Assessment Tool for Responsible Research Data Management." is the poster presented by the data stewards of the University of Bologna at the Open Science FAIR 2025 at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland, 15-17th September 2025 (https://www.opensciencefair.eu/).

Abstract:
“Should I openly share my algorithm on drone navigation?”; “Does my ethnographic research endanger me and my subjects?”  Security is increasingly endorsed as a principle that should underpin all research practices. Even if this concept appears to contrast with the core values of Open Science (OS), we argue that security and OS should coexist thanks to proper research data management (RDM). Specifically, adequate RDM increases the researchers’ accountability from both OS and security perspective. Thus, an integrated approach  becomes necessary to raise awareness among researchers of the challenges involved in aligning security concerns with OS values. In this poster, we operationalize this approach by providing a tool for researchers’ self-assessment. Namely, we enhance the decision tree for RDM developed by the data stewards at the University of Bologna. The decision tree proved to be a valuable instrument for raising awareness of the balance between FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reusable) data principles with the specific ethical, legal and contractual requirements around new and re-used data. We enrich the tree by adding security-related questions, which we define by thinking through two challenging case studies eliciting security concerns: First, dual-use research in the case of algorithms for drone navigation; Second, anticorruption research in dangerous contexts . In doing so, the decision tree becomes the single – integrated – instrument to lay the foundations of responsible RDM. Similarly, we envision data stewards as single points of contact within research services to strengthen accountability in research practices through responsible RDM.

The tool presented in the poster is an update of the "Research Data Management Decision Tree" (https://zenodo.org/records/7190005), although still in Beta version. The update consists in the addition of several questions mainly related to security and the transformation of the tree into an interactive dashboard that researchers can use to ask themselves the right questions in order to manage data consciously throughout its life cycle, with a focus especially on the planning phase. Security currently refers mainly to cyber security, dual-use risks and possible safety risks for participants and researchers.

The DOI of this poster is: 10.5281/zenodo.17193163

The license of this poster is: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/deed.it)

Poster formats: PDF, PNG