Data Donation

Software Service

This software service enables you to configure an online data donation study and make it available for respondents to donate their digital trace data in a privacy-preserving manner. The data donation workflow can be easily published on the Next platform. This software service is also known under the name Port.

Features

The following pages are optional:
- About page to inform respondents about your study
- Consent page for informed consent
- Helpdesk page‍
- Privacy statement (pdf file upload)
When the above pages are added, these are all visible for participants when clicking the "i" at the bottom corner. The about and consent pages are part of the onboarding of respondents and will also be shown before respondents enter the data donation workflow.
Choose the language for your respondents:
- English
- Dutch
- German
- Italian
- Spanish
Add custom branding to your data donation workflow, by changing the header image and adding a logo, title and subtitle.
Add as many tasks to your data donation workflow as you want in any order you like, the following tasks are available:
1. PDF manual: upload a pdf manual for your respondents on how to request or download the digital trace data.
2. Step-wise manual (mobile friendly): Create a step-wise mobile friendly manual with participant instructions on how to request or download the digital trace data.
3. Donate: workflow to donate the data in a privacy-preserving manner. Here you can upload the data donation flow application created with feldspar.‍
4. Questionnaire: link to a Qualtrics questionnaire with a round-trip back to the Next platform.
Get a link to the online data donation workflow and add a custom Participant ID that can be forwarded to your Qualtrics questionnaire and is used in the filename of the donated data.
Easily access, export and remove the donated data in your project data card
Monitor how many respondents have donated data and export a per respondent progress report

All features can be configured in the content management system (CMS) on the Next platform.

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What can we do for you?

Publish a data donation study on the Next platform: By creating an account on the Next platform, you can easily configure your data donation study in the Next platform CMS and publish it on our high-availability environment by simply clicking publish, after this it will be readily available for your participants. We take care of the availability and security.
Support with developing the data donation flow application script: A custom data extraction script needs to be developed to extract the data from the digital trace data packages that is relevant for your research question. With this python script data can be extracted in a privacy preserving manner locally on your respondents device, after which only the data relevant for your research question can be donated. If you or anyone on your team do not have the skills to develop this script (see feldspar repository) we can develop the script for you. We can also review the script in case you would like to have a quality assurance check.
Advise on how to set up a data donation study: If you are not sure how to set up a data donation study, you can check out the data donation website. Need some further advice? Contact us to see what we can do for you.
Data donation study in the LISS panel: We closely collaborate with Centerdata for data donation studies in the LISS panel.

Use the service

Thank you for your interest in using the data donation software service on the Next platform!

Publishing a data donation workflow on the platform requires a payment. This contribution directly supports the sustainable development of the Next ecosystem—an open-source infrastructure for social science, humanities, and health research.

We offer:

Data donation workflow hosting at a fixed rate
Optional support packages through a credit-based system

Credits give you the flexibility to use support services when needed, such as:

Technical support and onboarding
Script reviews and consultations
Custom script development and workflow setup‍

‍👉 Download our pricing information here.

Fair use policy

We want the data donation service to work well for everyone. This Fair Use Policy helps make sure the service is used responsibly, participant privacy is respected, and our shared infrastructure stays sustainable.
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👉 Read the Fair Use Policy here.

Ready to get started?

If you’d like to use the data donation service, just fill out our contact form. We’ll be happy to schedule a short call to discuss your needs and answer any questions.

Collaboration and Funding

The data donation software service was mostly developed in collaboration with:

Laura Boeschoten and Daniel Oberski (Utrecht University)
Theo Araujo and Niek de Schipper (University of Amsterdam)

With input from the broader D3i team. The development of this software service is mostly funded by the UU, PDI-SSH (D3i project), and Eyra. Additional features were added by users from Centerdata (LISS panel), Cambridge University and University of Mannheim among others. Next platform users support the continued availability of the software service. For more information about the D3i project, visit their data donation website.

Related literature

Boeschoten, L., Mendrik, A., van der Veen, E., Vloothuis, J., Hu, H., Voorvaart, R., & Oberski, D. L. (2022). Privacy-preserving local analysis of digital trace data: A proof-of-concept. Patterns, 3(3).
Boeschoten, L., Ausloos, J., Möller, J. E., Araujo, T., & Oberski, D. L. (2022). A framework for privacy preserving digital trace data collection through data donation. Computational Communication Research, 4(2), 388-423.
Carriere, T. C., Boeschoten, L., Struminskaya, B., Janssen, H. L., de Schipper, N. C., & Araujo, T. Best practices for studies using digital data donation.
Boeschoten, L., De Schipper, N.C., Mendrik, A.M., Van der Veen, E., Struminskaya, B., Janssen, H. and Araujo, T. (2023). Port: A software tool for digital data donation. Journal of Open Source Software, 8(90), 5596.

FAQ

How do I connect a Next data donation workflow to panel or survey software?

In the Integration tab of the CMS on the Next platform, you can configure an End of workflow URL or Progress webhook URL to receive automatic updates when a participant starts or completes a task, such as the data donation task.
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1. Using an end-of-workflow completion link

You can configure the workflow so that participants are redirected at the end of the data donation flow to a predefined URL.

For example: https://panel-company.com/study?s=done‍

After the participant completes the data donation workflow, they are redirected to this URL. You can also provide a name for the destination organisation or software that will be shown to the participants.
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2. Using a webhook for progress updates

This allows panel software to automatically track participant progress.

For example: https://panel-company.com/study?s=progress‍

This webhook will then be called after the status of a task changes:

https://panel-company.com/study?s=done&p=1&d=xx&k=yy&Data-donation=started‍

Where:

- p=1 is the participant ID

- Data-donation is the task name

- started (or completed) is the task status

- d=xx and k=yy are custom participant-specific parameters provided by a panel if required

Custom parameters can be attached to the invitation link and are automatically forwarded by the Next platform.

In this case: https://next.eyra.co/a/orpHxn?p=1&d=xx&k=yy‍

How do I contact the Next platform support?

The easiest way to reach us is through the Helpdesk inside the Next platform.

Go to Helpdesk in the bottom-left corner and submit your question — our support team will get back to you as soon as possible.

You can also contact us directly by email at support@eyra.co.

How do I add collaborators to my study?

To add collaborators, they need to already have an account on the Next platform.

Once they do:

Go to your project tile.
Click the three dots in the bottom-left corner.
Select People.
Type your collaborator’s email address.
Click Add.

They will immediately gain full access to your project. Make sure you type the full email address of the collaborator.

🎥 You can also watch the short instruction video here.

How can I track progress for my data donation study?

There are two ways to track progress:

Monitor tab (overall progress)
In your data donation study item on the Next platform, the Monitor tab shows the overall event progress — for example, how many participants started the workflow, started or finished each task, and completed the full workflow.
‍Progress report (per-participant progress)
On the same Monitor tab, you can export a Progress report. This CSV file shows the progress per participant, including participant IDs and the steps they started or completed.

Why does the Preview not show the initial About and Consent pages?

The Preview feature works exactly like the real participant workflow.

Because of this, the About and Consent pages are only shown the first time you open the Preview and give consent. After that, they won’t appear again.

You can still use the Preview to (re)test the data donation flow itself as often as needed.

If you want to see the About and Consent pages again, open the participant invite link after publishing the workflow in a private/incognito window or use a different browser.

How do I test my data donation participant workflow?

You have two options:

Use the Preview feature
This lets you walk through your participant flow as participants will see it — without publishing the study. It’s the quickest way to check manuals and the data donation flow before going live.
‍Publish the study and test with a participant link
After publishing, your flow is live, and you can use the participant link to go through the workflow as if you were a real participant.
We recommend using test participant IDs, for example:
- Test 1
- Test 2

This helps you easily identify and filter out test data later.

I can’t publish my study — what should I do?

Publishing a study is only possible once your payment has been received and your account has been verified for publishing.

If you can’t publish yet, it usually means one of these steps is still pending.

If you believe everything should be activated already, feel free to contact us at support@eyra.co and we’ll help you get set up.

Still have questions? Fill out our contact form below.