Denmark
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Country Profile for Denmark
Legislative and organisational background
Electronic records are dealt with by the National Archives, and several municipal archives. The regulations concerning electronic records are to be found in several pieces of legislation:
The Archives Act is the basic regulation and, of course, the most distinguished in the legislative hierarchy. It is adopted by the parliament and signed by the Queen. The first Archives Act came into effect in 1992 and it has been revised 4 times. The present Archives Act came into effect in 2007.
The Archives Consolidation Act is issued by the Minister of Culture, and it elaborates on the provisions of the Archives Act.
Circulars and orders issued by the State Archives / the National Archivist are the most detailed sets of regulations, based on the powers that are bestowed upon the State Archives in the Archives Act and the Archives Consolidation Act.
In the following, some of the main points concerning electronic records will be highlighted. The Archives Act states that
• authorities must ensure that records that are stored digitally are preserved in a way so that they can be transferred to public archives
• state authorities must transfer the records that are worthy of preservation to the State Archives at times determined by the State Archives. For paper records it is stated that these should be transferred before they are 30 years old, for records that are stored digitally it is specified, that the State Archives determine when the transfer takes place and that the transfer can take place before the records are 30 years old. That is very important because it gives us the opportunity to demand that the authorities create archival versions of their databases and document management systems early enough to minimize the risk of technological obsolescence.
For the local authorities (municipalities and counties) there is no general obligation to transfer records, but of course there is an obligation to preserve the records that the State Archives decide are to be preserved. For data in IT-systems that are covered by the Act on Processing of Personal Data (the Data Protection Act), i.e. systems that contain information about identifiable persons, the Archives Act states that such data, when found to be worthy of preservation, must be transferred to a public archive before the information is deleted according to the provisions of the Data Protection Act.
It is a very important feature of the Danish Data Protection Act (at least seen from an archivist’s point of view), that it clearly states that data covered by the act can be transferred to a public archive under the provisions of the Archives Act. This means that even if information has to be deleted after a certain number of years, that demand does not affect the ability of the archives to store that information and let it reemerge after 75 years when the general inaccessibility clause expires. (Records without sensitive information are accessible without any restrictions when they are more than 20 years old; records with sensitive information are not accessible without restrictions until they are 75 years old).
Basically, we consider all electronic systems to fall into one of these three categories:
• Databases. These can contain almost any kind of information gathered by the authorities in connection with their business, but they are not used for document management purposes.
• Electronic records management systems, where metadata about documents and files is in digital form, but where the actual documents are physical paper documents and thus not part of the electronic system
• Electronic records management systems where both the documents themselves and the relevant metadata are stored digitally.
The National Archives does not archive web pages since this is dealt with by the Royal Library/State Library.
Management of databases
When a state authority takes a new system into use, there are different regulations depending on the type of system in question. If the system is a database without any document management functions, it is sufficient for the authority to notify the National Archives two weeks before the database is taken into use. The notification must be made using a special form and include information about the purpose of the system as well as a description of the data in the system, along with other information that is necessary for the appraisal process. Databases are not subject to approval by the National Archives but the notification takes place so that the databases can be appraised as early as possible. Provided that the data is found worthy of preservation, the date for the first delivery of data from the system concerned is set at the time of appraisal. Usually, the first transfer takes place after 5 years of operation. We inform the authority in question about the technical specifications for the transfer, so that they have ample time to figure out if there are any problems concerning the conversion of data from their particular database into an archival version. Apart from that, the main regulations for databases are found in the Act on Processing of Personal Data. According to this act, personal data can only be stored in the agencies that collect data for a limited period of time. After this time has expired, data must either be deleted or transferred to an archive.
Electronic Records Management Systems
Electronic Records Management Systems in state agencies have to go through a process not only of appraisal but also of approval. Therefore, the notification on new document management systems has to take place at least three months before the system is taken into use. The notification must be made using a standard form and include
• a description of the retrieval system (e.g. filing plan, index terms, metadata required to retrieve documents)
• draft instructions for the use of the system
• technical documentation
An ERMS cannot be taken into use until the National Arhives has issued an approval. The system can only operate for a limited period of time, usually 5 years, before a copy of data and documents is transferred to the National Archives. After this, a new approval for the next 5-year period is required.
There are no specific metadata requirements from the National Archives. When files and documents are transferred, all metadata applied by the agency will be transferred as part of the archival version. However, as of January 1, 2008, all new records management systems must be compliant with the FESD-standard, which is derived from the Norwegian NOARK-standard.
Ingest and pre-ingest in general
When data and documents are transferred to the National Archives, it must be migrated to a system independent format based strictly on standards. Some of the main points are,
• Data must be transferred as a system independent archival version
• the data must be structured as a relational database
• there must be sufficient metadata to describe structure and content
• general information about the system must be included
• the documents must be converted to a standardized format (TIFF)
• when the system in question is a records management system, some SQL-queries must be included
A very important point is, that this migration/conversion to an archival version is the responsibility of the agencies.
Pre-ingest actions for datasets
See above
Pre-ingest actions for ERM systems
See above
Transfer to archives
Ingest actions for datasets
Ingest actions for electronic records
Other comments and remarks
This year, we are revising the standards for transfer of digital records/datasets. We are particularly looking into • PDF/A
• A better document format for spread sheets (possibly ODF or OOXML)
• A standard for transfer of geographical informaion (GML?)
References
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