Tools-to-Data: Report of a Proof-of-Concept

‘Tools-to-data’ is a secure environment that allows researchers to analyse data that are sensitive, private or protected under copyright law. The data remain in a safe environment. Depending on the needs, they cannot be copied or even viewed. Tools-to-data can help improve the results of humanities research by making more data available.

Researchers can work with the data by uploading their analysis tools to the secure environment. By bringing the tools to the data, things are turned around compared to the currently usual practice of providing the researcher with a copy of the data.

The researcher will receive the results of the tool, after checks by the data provider for unwanted data leakage.

This report describes a proof-of-concept where tools-to-data was examined with real life research cases and real life data. This showed that tools-to-data is an important addition to humanities research and other fields.