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- BLOG - Access to secure data during the Covid-19 pandemic - a model for the future?
- Covid-19 and Care Homes: Advances in Administrative Data Research during the pandemic
- DATA INSIGHTS -Deprivation and informal care at the end of life
- NEWS - Innovative new residential linkage tool launched
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home- No.4
- DATA INSIGHTS - Youth Movements, Social Mobility and Health Inequalities
- NEWS - New report warns of deepening poverty crisis for Scottish families
- New report on Infants Born into Care in Scotland
- Spotlight on Dr Elizabeth Lemmon
- Spotlight on Jan Savinc
- BLOG - The value of social science and administrative data research in Scotland: how we are helping respond to COVID-19
- DATA INSIGHTS - Exploring illegal drug consignments in Scotland
- DATA INSIGHTS -Linking two administrative data sets about looked after children
- NEWS – ADR Scotland data ambassadors launched
- The importance of administrative data
- Virtual Conference - Data Linkage: Information to Impact
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home - No.7
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home- No.3
- DATA INSIGHTS - Investigating the effects of class composition and class size on pupils’ attainment in Scottish primary schools
- NEWS - New opportunity to join ADR Scotland’s Public Panel
- BLOG - Exploring the potential of synthetic data
- DATA INSIGHTS - Automatic Coding of Occupations: Methods to create the Scottish Historic Population Database (SHPD)
- DATA INSIGHTS - Selective schools: do they improve health?
- EVENT - Active Travel: New Data, New Insights
- EVENT - Holyrood Evidence Week: Doing Data Better for Policy and Public Good
- BLOG - Geospatial Ambitions
- BLOG - Taking historical death records and developing a database for future analysis
- DATA INSIGHTS - Community mortality due to Covid-19
- Future-proofing investment into administrative data research announced in Scotland
- NEWS - Understanding the dynamics of the nursing workforce: the potential of routinely collected data
- Spotlight on Katherine Falconer
- ADR Scotland publishes its strategy for 2022-2026
- BLOG: Developing a cross-national research agenda on crime and convictions
- BLOG: Working together to make a difference with data
- DATA INSIGHTS - Homelessness duration in Scotland: how long does rehousing take?
- DATA INSIGHTS - Occupation and COVID-19 deaths: Scotland in a comparative perspective
- DATA INSIGHTS -The health and economic benefits of active commuting in Scotland
- IPDLN Conference - Data linkage research: informing policy and practice
- Spotlight on Dr Evan Williams
- Spotlight on Fernando Pantoja
- Spotlight on Laurie Berrie
- ADR Scotland Winter Partnership Session - **internal event**
- BLOG - AGEING AND HOMELESSNESS IN SCOTLAND
- BLOG - Can we use linked administrative data to identify social disadvantage?
- BLOG - Commuting and its impact on health
- BLOG - The Dynamics of the Nursing Workforce in the UK: Using data to support our nurses
- BLOG: Growing up in kinship care
- DATA INSIGHTS - Analysing a season of death and excess mortality in Scotland’s past
- EVENT - ADR UK Virtual Half Day event
- Event - Public data for public good: towards better understanding children's lives
- NEWS - Data research initiative secures £90 m funding extension
- NEWS: Our role supporting the new Covid-19 research data service in Scotland
- Spotlight on Michelle K Jamieson
- Webinar - An Introduction to Looked-After Children Dataset
- BLOG - An Inside Job: Using Criminology, Police Data and a Lot of Nouse
- BLOG - Improving justice data to promote data justice in Scotland
- BLOG - Location of death in 2020: a changing trend from hospitals to homes
- BLOG - Seeking feedback on Research Data Scotland’s core principles via our public panel
- BLOG - What skills, training and support are required by those wishing a career as an administrative data researcher?
- BLOG No. 9 - Final blog in this 'deaths at home' series
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home - No. 6
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home - No.8
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home- No.5
- BLOG: 5 things I've learnt about working with policymakers...
- BLOG: Automating Coding for Large Historical Datasets
- BLOG: COVID-19- How increased deaths at home impact the carer community
- DATA INSIGHTS -Postal deliveries of drugs in Scotland
- EVENT - 'Getting things done with data in government'
- EVENT - Linking public sector data for research: an ADR UK showcase event
- EVENT Seminar - Administrative data for social policy research: potential and pitfalls
- NEWS - Additional funding for Understanding Children’s Lives and Outcomes
- NEWS - Engaging children and young people
- NEWS: Police use of Fixed Penalty Notices under the Covid-19 regulations in Scotland: A new data report highlights links with deprivation and inequality
- NEWS: Police use of the new Covid-19 powers: Using administrative data to analyse and evaluate practice
- Research Data Scotland - New user forum
- Spotlight on Dr Patricio Troncoso
- Summary of ADR Scotland Winter Partnership session
- Directorship of the International Population Data Linkage Network (IPDLN) for 2021-22.
- BLOG: In the light of experience: InterRAI and the final thousand days of life
- Multiple health conditions and social care
- NEWS - Susan McVie elected as Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences
- SCADR relocates to the Bayes Centre
- EVENT: Four day introduction to using administrative data for social and health research
- BLOG: The value of administrative data: DALYs and the Scottish Burden of Disease study
- BLOG: Where to start with parliamentary and policy engagement
- EVENT - International Conference on Administrative Data Research, Cardiff
- EVENT - Using data to realise the potential of the 'Last 1000 days'
- EVENT: TalkingData: ADR Scotland mini-summit
- EVENT: “Let’s use data to save time, money and lives”: ADR Scotland partners gather for mini-summit
- EVENTS: ADR Scotland researchers present at international conference in Cardiff
- SafePod Network
Keeping data safe
We follow a strict framework to ensure data is kept secure and that all research is in the public interest.
Guiding principles and the 'Five Safes'
In Scotland, research follows the Guiding Principles for Data Linkage which are designed to support the safe and appropriate use of data for research and statistical purposes. They ensure data linkage takes place within a controlled environment and that the research carried out is legal, ethical, secure and efficient.
The principles align with the established ‘Five Safes’ framework, developed by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) to ensure data is kept safe and secure:
- Safe Data: Data provided to researchers is ‘de-identified’, meaning no information which can directly identify individuals is included.
- Safe Person: Any researcher accessing administrative data is assessed for their skills and suitability before being granted access to the data needed for their project.
- Safe Project: The research project itself is scrutinised and must be in the public interest.
- Safe Place: Data must be accessed in a safe and secure room within one of our facilities, or otherwise via an assured connection at an accredited institution.
- Safe Output: The researcher’s actions whilst accessing the data are monitored using keystroke technology and all outputs (publications, presentations or articles) are checked thoroughly, with any potentially re-identifiable information removed.
Data about individuals
Administrative data is largely information about how people interact with public services or government departments. We know this is important to keep secure, and our researchers only ever have access data which has had anything which can directly identify an individual (like names, dates of birth, full addresses) removed, with rigorous safeguards in place to protect it from re-identification (including strict separation of functions of those involved in the process). What is left is a set of information about unidentified individuals and their interactions with public services, allowing for relationships between these to be analysed. This information is very useful for research, without giving away information about identified members of the public.
Administrative data is linked and processed for research in compliance with GDPR regulations (via the ‘public task’ lawful basis). Processing data is lawful where it “is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest” where it is set out in law; meaning that the organisation involved or overall task must have a clear basis in law. The law this is clarified in will change depending on the organisations involved, for example universities’ charters set out their core functions as including research.
Who can access data for research
In addition to ensuring researchers do not have access to data which can directly identify individuals, there are also rigorous safeguards in place to ensure data cannot be accessed by anyone who is not authorised, or for any reason other than research that passes the public benefit test.
Researchers wishing to use the data go through rigorous approvals processes set by the organisations responsible for the data. These include checking the researcher is from a suitable research institution; has completed appropriate training; has undertaken an ethics assessment of the proposed research to ensure its delivers benefit to the public and that the data access requested matches the research questions being asked.
Once researchers have been suitably trained and their project approved, they must then access the data via a secure physical facility – or a secure connection to that facility – provided by our centre or one of our partners. Researcher activity and outputs within these facilities are closely monitored, and outputs checked before being released, to ensure the data has not been misused in any way.