Automating GDPR-Compliant Consent Forms: A Modular and Interdisciplinary Approach

Maryam Mohammadi, Aliena Strathmann, Katja Politt, Annett B. Jorschick, Hendrik Buschmeier

Keywords: consent forms, personal data, GDPR, modules, ontology

TL;DR: This paper presents a modular, ontology-based framework and the first implementation of an automated GDPR-compliant consent form application.

Abstract: Legal and ethical requirements surrounding the processing of (personal) data have become increasingly complex, introducing a great degree of overhead to scientific research requiring the processing of data generated by human participants. In order to facilitate the process of ethical and GDPR-compliant data processing, we introduce a modular, ontology-based framework and first implementation of an automation tool that balances technical, legal and user group requirements based on interdisciplinary expertise; allowing researchers to easily generate tailored, comprehensible data processing information and consent forms for study participants. A future goal is to expand this framework into a more extensive data management platform, to promote ethical and legally compliant use and re-use of (linguistic) study datasets across research teams and domains according to Open Science principles.

Submission Number: 7