62 Activity 4.1: Reflection
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Lesson 16 of 18
This module covered:
- An introduction to ways to safeguard your data. It reviewed three types of safeguards:
- Physical safeguards
- Administrative safeguards
- Technical safeguards
Securely storing and backing up your data is an important part of research data management that helps you to address risks to your ability to complete your project (i.e., by protecting against loss), and to address risks to any research participants or personally identifiable information (i.e., by adequately protecting the data from hacking and bad actors).
With your own research project in mind respond to the following prompts:
- Investigate your local institution’s IT and research computing offerings. What is available to you and is it suitable for your project?
- Investigate your institution’s research and IT policies. Does your institution have a classification for sensitive data?
- If you have human participant data, you could also review guidance provided by your research office or research ethics board.
- Consider physical, administrative, and technical safeguards. What are some safeguards you could use to protect your data?
If you do not have a research project in mind, download either:
Data Management Plan for Computational Reproducibility in High-Performance Computing (HPC) exemplar (Zhiang, 2020)
Data Management Plan for People, Places, Policies and Prospects: Affordable Rental Housing for Those in Greatest Need exemplar (Leviten-Reid, 2020)
Examine the type of data the author is collecting and their plans for data storage and backup, then assume you want to conduct a similar study and respond to the following prompts:
- Investigate your local institution’s IT and research computing offerings. What is available to you and is it suitable for your project?
- Investigate your institution’s research and IT policies. Does your institution have a classification for sensitive data?
- If you have human participant data, you could also review guidance provided by your research office or research ethics board.
- Consider physical, administrative, and technical safeguards. What are some safeguards that the exemplar author used to protect their data? Would you implement similar safeguards?
