Introduction
We are please to share with you that ABR project team handled an interesting discussion with Danish authorities on their work on base registries, based on the questions from the Interview Guide.
We are please to share the highlights of the discussion with ABR community in this news article below.
Highlights of interview
In Denmark, registries are combination of coexistence and consolidation style, they are autonomous, but they can communicate with each other. This interconnection is based on law, as well as the authoritative source and ownership of data. Denmark has a long tradition and history in having authoritative registries and data sets. One of the first digital registries in the world was established in this country – and it was a Civil Registration number registry (hereafter CPR registry), dated from 1968. There is also a centralised platform of the Base registries called Data Distributor[1], which collects the data from all registries, and it is the unique point of centralisation of data in Denmark
In the previous national digitalization strategy, the authorities met and discussed the challenges and issues they were facing with different aspects related to data. The solution was to establish the Basic Data program[2], and its definition and implementation helped to come across the majority of challenges.
With regard to data quality, the update of data is done on a registry level, and Data Distributor joins the process when the data are ready for publication and distribution to data consumers. In case the data is incorrect, then the update follows a complex set of rules. In simple cases, citizen can correct the mistake, if stated in the law, by updating his own data, e.g. on municipal level. In this case, the responsible to fill-in corrected information is the first contacted Registry, i.e. municipality, and other registries that re-use this data are responsible to approve the data inputted by the first registry. Issues occur when a specific case is regulated differently among laws. However, Denmark is continuously improving the legislation, asking for feedback from the authorities that are applying the law.
Interchange of data is secured by the national eID/ nemID scheme through the national single sign on solution - EasyLog-in (NemLog-in).
Denmark aims at harmonising the data among registries, rather than centralising them. The Central Business Register (CVR) is expanding the subset of their data that is distributed via the Data Distributor. This does not affect the data structures within the register, it only changes the dataset made available on the Data Distributor (the data in question is already available through other channels so the move is mostly an increase in the “convenience level” for the users).
Thus, the base registries are living systems under political control from parliament, which means that they will need to adjust their data models and distribution methods over time.
Data Distributor is architecturally prepared to support the share of data on cross-border level, however, there are still some issues with confidential data, which need to be solved.