Dataverse 5.0 - Sensitive Data

[danny...@g.harvard.edu]

Hi everyone,

We’ve been working towards a 5.0 release in Q4 of 2017. In this release, we’ve been planning to provide support for sensitive data through DataTags, enabling the depositing, storage, and retrieval of differentially private metadata, and updated application security based on recommendations by the Harvard University Information Technology (HUIT) Security Office. 

The work for this release is well underway, but all will not be delivered before the end of the year as planned. Some specifics:

- We’ve been delivering small parts of the security requirements over the last several releases, such as password guessing attack mitigation, enhanced password complexity, and the ability to disable accounts. Most of these recommendations have been met and have been released.

- Support for differential privacy is currently in development, and we’re taking this opportunity to plan our approach to configuring external tools and how users explore data, sensitive or not. Our goal is to have a proof of concept for Dataverse integration with a differential privacy tool before the end of the year.

- The integration with DataTags is challenging from a technical design and UI/UX design standpoint. We are planning improvements to the dataset page that have been requested by the community, along with UI changes necessary for DataTags.

Instead of Q4 of 2017, we expect to deliver this work in Q2 of 2018.

Please let us know if you have any questions. 

[Eugene Barsky]

Hello Danny:

Thanks for this update. We re looking forward to the DataTags release and will be delighted to test drive it for you once ready.

Eugene @UBC