Data Research, Access and Governance Network (DRAGoN)

The ADR UK funded Wage and Employment Dynamics (WED) initiative that aims to provide new insights into the dynamics of earnings and employment in Great Britain has made a new dataset available. Accredited researchers can apply to use the de-identified Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings (ASHE) – 2011 Census linked dataset from the Office for … Continue reading "New linked dataset available to provide insights into earnings and employment in Britain"

Written by Elizabeth Green (UWE Bristol), Felix Ritchie (UWE Bristol) and Amy Tilbrook (University of Edinburgh) Many researchers in the UK working with confidential data attend the ‘Safe Researcher Training’ course (SRT). This training course was commissioned by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) in 2017 and is (so far) the only accredited training programme … Continue reading "Teaching researchers about data protection law: a terrible idea"

The digitalization of health and medicine has engendered a proliferation of new collaborations between public health institutions and data corporations, such as Google, Apple, Microsoft and Amazon. Critical perspectives on this “Googlization of health” tend to frame the risks involved in this phenomenon in one of two ways: either as predominantly privacy and data protection … Continue reading "DRAGoN Seminar: Sphere transgressions: Risks and Benefits of the Digitisation of Health"

The Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), the body that allocates and oversees social science research funding across the UK higher education sector, will face some significant decisions in data infrastructure and services over the next few years: several of its major investments are due for re-tendering, while others are already in the process of … Continue reading "UWE staff appointed to help ESRC plan its data infrastructure strategy"

Green paper Elizabeth Green1, Felix Ritchie 1, Libby Bishop2, Deborah Wiltshire 2, Simon Parker 3, Allyson Flaster 4 and Maggie Levenstein4  1The University of the West of England, 2GESIS, 3DKFZ German Cancer Research Center, 4University of Michigan Context When carrying out research with confidential quantitative data, there is much support for researchers. There is ample … Continue reading "What are the output disclosure control issues associated with qualitative data?"

Researchers requesting microdata (individual records) from data centres or data access panels are usually required to describe the legal basis for their use of the data. This is because data controllers and processors need to have a legal basis documented for each use of data under UK GDPR.  However, researchers are usually unaware of legal bases. The … Continue reading "Legal bases and Using Secure Data for Research"

Welcome to the Data Research, Access and Governance Network (DRAGoN) blog where we will share the latest updates and projects we’re involved with. Led by Professor Felix Ritchie the Management Team also includes Dr Kyle Alves (Business & Management) Elizabeth Green (Economics) Dr Francesco Tava (Philosophy) and Damian Whittard (Economics). Formed in Autumn 2020, DRAGoN … Continue reading "Welcome to the Data Research, Access & Governance Network (DRAGoN) blog"

Bristol Centre for Economics and Finance hosted an online event on 28th May 2020: Rules vs. Principles-based Regulation: What can we learn from different professions? Below is a summary and recording of each session. Session 1: Data regulation  Lizzie Green at UWE introduced the principles-based approach to data governance. She noted that protecting data is easy: just … Continue reading "Event Summary: Rules vs Principles-based Regulations, what can we learn from different professions?"