Web Archives For All? Towards Equitable Access to UK Public Sector Web Archives

This paper examines equitable access to UK Public Sector Web Archives, considering their shared duty as publicly funded institutions to ensure access for all users.Through staff interviews, an overview of current practices for describing collections, providing access, and engaging users are analyzed for the first time, revealing significant disparities between institutions and a lack of best practices to address unique challenges in curating and managing access to web archives.The role of best practice is assessed, finding whilst some alignment with existing standards exists, there is an urgent need for developing best practices based on existing consensus and wider digital preservation frameworks.This approach acknowledges the significant challenges facing web archive practitioners as well as users.The paper then looks ahead to next steps -highlighting three areas of inequity to urgently address alongside three areas where equitable practices are emerging and require continued community support.This 'way forward' begins to redress the power imbalances inherent in information creation and distribution, enabling web archives to fulfil their responsibilities to the public as custodians of their online heritage.