As we’ve written on this blog before, policymakers, data ethics practitioners, researchers and businesses have spent the past few years discussing how data trusts could help fill the gaps in our current data governance landscape. The Data Trusts Initiative is seeking to shift the dial in these discussions from theory to practice, identifying the actions needed to create viable data trusts and supporting pilot data trusts projects. Our first Working Paper, published today, seeks to support this shift by setting out some of the areas where we need to better understand the conceptual underpinnings of data trusts and how they might work.

Data trusts are mechanisms for individuals to pool the data rights created by current legislation into an organisation – a trust – in which trustees make decisions about data use on their behalf. Complementing the regulatory regimes that already exist in many countries, these new data institutions would seek to manage the vulnerabilities that arise from shifting patterns of data use. Through a combination of independent stewardship, institutional safeguards, and collective action, data trusts could help empower individuals and groups to influence the terms by which data about them may be used. 

Achieving this goal will require action to clarify the nature of the rights and responsibilities of those involved in a trust, identify the tools that can manage those rights and responsibilities, and set in place the mechanisms that can ensure data trusts achieve their intended purpose. These areas for action form the basis of a varied interdisciplinary research agenda – summarised in our Working Paper (Data Trusts: from theory to practice) – and include:

  • Conceptual clarity: How do data trusts fit in the wider data governance landscape, and which core capabilities must sit at the heart of any real-world data trust?

  • Accountability: What institutional safeguards would help ensure a data trust represents and operates for the benefit of those it purports to serve?

  • Participation, inclusion and digital equity: Which interventions can help make data trusts accessible to all in society, and ensure that all those in a trust can meaningfully contribute to decision-making?

  • Finance and sustainability: Which business models can help ensure the continued sustainability of a data trust?

  • Implementation issues: Which use cases can help clarify how data trusts would work in practice?

Tackling these research challenges will take a community – of lawyers, technologies, policy experts, public engagement specialists, social entrepreneurs, and more – to synthesise insights from across research disciplines and develop ideas about the structures or practices that need to be in place to create real-world data trusts. As a starting point in helping create this community, we’re inviting applications for funding to carry out research that can help us understand how to move data trusts from theory to practice. We’re looking for projects that bring together interdisciplinary teams working on issues that are central to the development and implementation of data trusts.

This funding call is open until 29 January, and you can find further details about how to apply in our funding FAQs post. In the meantime, if you’d like to join this community and hear more about the work of the Data Trusts Initiative, please sign up to our mailing list.