Data

Digital platforms are constantly gaining importance in our society. Within different application domains, data is stored in cloud-based platform. Public as well as private actors can offer data-driven solutions that create an added value for citizens and stimulate the local economy. Thanks to the use of technological innovations that enable the implementation of a personal data vault for every citizen or entity (a so-called data pod), we can go one step further and allow for novel decentralized data ecosystems that have an important potential for innovation.

Some example projects:

• icon.SHARCS - Selective sharing of accredited solid pod data in an HR context (imec.icon project 2023-2024)

Personal Data Pods (based on the Solid protocol) are proposed as a way to securely store personal data and allow data sharing between individuals and apps/third parties. Sharing personal data, however, present us with several challenges regarding what is shared, with whom, for which purpose. The SHARCS project aims to solve a number of these challenges for the case of secure and selective sharing of accredited personal data.

The specific challenges tackled will be to research how it is possible to guarantee that partial information, or information aggregated from several certified sources remains reliable or certified. On top of that, a receiver may have a legal obligation to receive and store a copy of certain certified information (e.g., a diploma). At the same time, the individual must always remain in control over the data in their personal data pod. Therefore the question is: How can we solve the conflict between control and transparency for the user and the legal obligations and needs of the third parties that rely on the data?

• SolidLab - Your data, your choice. Advancing Web standards to empower people (2022-2024)

In SOLIDLab Flanders, supported and financed by the Flemish government, the consortium will investigate how the use of personal data pods can be facilitated. These personal data pods are grounded in the idea that with enough information presented in the right way, users can overcome barriers in managing their personal data that are structural and systemic in nature (the logic of ‘privacy self-management’). Personal data pods are also a key technical component in Solid; they allow an individual to control his or her own data in an individual ‘data safe’. Companies can then access a person’s data, with permission, through a secure link for a specific task. SolidLab Vlaanderen wants to make Flanders an international leading innovator in the domain of personal data pods and their societal and economic valorization.

• CoGhent - Collections of Ghent (Urban Innovative Action, 2020-2023)

CoGhent ensures we can make great strides in the short term regarding the digitization and opening-up of both museum collections and the city archive. The ambition is that this project lays the foundation for a participatory platform that can benefit all heritage organizations within the city.

• Bilateral project with VIM - Governance of mobility data (bilateral project, 2015-2016)

This project tackles two core questions about big data in the mobility sector. First, it investigates how the multitude of mobility data can be handled, stored and accessed, while in a second step, the value of this data for the relevant stakeholders is quantified. You can find the final project report here