Justifying Biodiversity Data Access Restrictions: A Global Comparison of Data Policies

ABSTRACT Web‐accessible biodiversity databases accept and openly share species observations from the public, benefitting research, conservation, and education. However, public data sharing can also bring harm, for example by facilitating poaching. Databases may mitigate harm by designating certain species as “sensitive” and restricting access to those species data. In this paper, we describe how 39 databases that share participatory science data justify automatic data access restrictions based on species‐related concerns. We developed a codebook describing rationales for restricting access to sensitive species data and analyzed rationale use in relation to database characteristics such as size, type, host institution type, national origin, and taxonomic scope. We found a small set of commonly used rationales, wide variation in the number of rationales provided, and a surprising number of databases citing few rationales. Larger databases, aggregators, and governmental databases tended to cite more rationales, but there were numerous outliers. We hope our framework of rationales will support databases seeking to document data restrictions and assist with the creation of controlled vocabulary terms. The study also provides examples that could guide data curation education about responsible policy development.