Who decides how Indigenous data and knowledge should be managed, governed, and used? Historically, the answer in the cultural heritage sector has not been Indigenous communities.

Today, Indigenous institutions face numerous obstacles to reclaiming data sovereignty. Archival management, collections management, and digital asset management solutions must evolve to support Indigenous governance structures and redress colonial harms. 

The United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) enshrines the rights of Indigenous Peoples to self-determination—including self-determination over their data.  

With rights rooted in UNDRIP, community-led frameworks, data decolonializing practices, and solutions that uphold IDSov, Indigenous institutions can strengthen self-governance and data sovereignty.

Note: The term “Indigenous” will be used in a general sense throughout this blog. However, it is crucial to note that Indigenous Peoples across the world exist as distinct, diverse communities with their own cultures, heritage, languages, and traditions.

What is Indigenous data sovereignty (IDSov)?

Broadly, Indigenous data sovereignty is Indigenous Peoples’ right to own data about them, their communities, and their protocols, and control how it is accessed, used, and shared. 

In the cultural heritage sector, IDSov includes digital repatriation, a practice of returning data and digital surrogates held by institutions—like museums, archives, and government entities—to Indigenous communities. The objective is to repair injustices and facilitate Indigenous self-governance.

IDSov is deeply rooted in Indigenous self-determination. Achieving it means acknowledging how data has historically been shaped by paternalism and colonialism in the cultural heritage sector.

Keep the following in mind when considering IDSov: 

• Data isn’t neutral: Recognize that data is embedded within power structures and colonial legacies that have historically excluded and misrepresented Indigenous Peoples. For example, many Indigenous collections objects in museums were stolen and interpreted without Indigenous context or consent.
  
  

• Tangible and intangible heritage: Understand that data sovereignty applies to both tangible and intangible heritage, including digital representations of objects, recordings, stories, language materials, and traditional knowledge.
  
  

• No singular approach: Acknowledge that Indigenous groups are unique and entitled to self-determination and self-governance of their data. Therefore, each community’s approach to IDSov may be different.

No matter the approach, Indigenous Peoples must always be recognized as rights holders and partners in the management and collection of their data.

While data sovereignty establishes your Indigenous institution or community’s data rights, data governance involves how those rights are applied. Your data governance protocols will help you bring IDSov to life in meaningful, concrete ways. 

Why IDSov matters for cultural heritage institutions

Indigenous cultural heritage institutions deserve solutions that support their unique data sovereignty, governance, and protocol structures.

Historically, Indigenous cultural knowledge and materials have been collected, catalogued, and displayed without appropriate Indigenous consultation or consent. 

While digital technologies have expanded access, they often lack appropriate cultural protocols or safeguards. In fact, many digital asset management systems (DAMS), collections management systems (CMS), and similar solutions were not created with IDSov in mind.

The result? Indigenous communities continue to face ongoing challenges reclaiming control over their cultural heritage data and narratives—and managing this data when they do regain it.

Indigenous Peoples must be empowered to lead IDSov initiatives. But creating meaningful change requires collaboration across the cultural heritage ecosystem. Both institutions and technology vendors have roles to play:

• Institutions: Have ethical and legal responsibilities to reform practices that have marginalized Indigenous voices. By following Indigenous communities’ lead on IDSov, they can build meaningful relationships and empower their Indigenous partners.
  
  

• Vendors: Partner with Indigenous organizations by offering DAMS, CMS, and related solutions that protect their right to data sovereignty. These solutions should be configurable by their users and provide granular, role-based access to support each institution’s data governance and protocol structures.

Guiding frameworks and principles

Community-created frameworks offer Indigenous institutions and communities the language, structure, and authority to uphold IDSov. Though different frameworks exist—especially at a grassroots level—two of the main ones are OCAP® and CARE.

Consider using these frameworks to inform the governance and repatriation of Indigenous data to your community. As rights holders, you can develop protocols for how partnerships should work when collaborating with non-Indigenous stakeholders.

OCAP® Principles

Developed by the First Nations Information Governance Centre (FNIGC) in Canada, the OCAP® principles are a foundational framework for First Nations data governance. 

Designed by and for First Nations, the principles ensure community control over First Nations data, including collection, use, and sharing.

Importantly, the framework isn’t one-size-fits-all. Each principle is designed to be flexible, so it can align with the worldviews of the First Nations Peoples and communities whose data is being governed.

The OCAP® acronym stands for:

• Ownership: Recognizes that Indigenous communities collectively own their cultural information
  
  

• Control: States that Indigenous Peoples have the right to control all aspects of research and information management that impact them
  
  

• Access: Affirms the rights of Indigenous Peoples to access data about themselves or their communities, no matter where or by whom it’s held
  
  

• Possession: Maintains and protects Indigenous ownership and control of data through appropriate governance mechanisms

Interested in learning more? FNIGC offers a Fundamentals of OCAP® course designed for First Nations Peoples and people that handle First Nations data. It explores the OCAP principles and First Nations self-determination, data sovereignty, and governance.

CARE Principles

The CARE Principles for Indigenous Data Governance were developed by the Global Indigenous Data Alliance (GIDA) in 2019. 

At the time, the FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable) open data principles focused on how data is shared. This set aside other important considerations—like the power dynamics and historical context that impacted how the data came to be. 

In response, the CARE principles were created to reflect Indigenous rights and interests. They invite data movements to consider not just the data itself, but the people it represents and impacts.

The CARE acronym stands for:

• Collective Benefit: Design data ecosystems to enable Indigenous communities to receive benefits from data
  
  

• Authority to Control: Recognize Indigenous rights and interests in data and respect Indigenous Peoples’ authority to control that data
  
  

• Responsibility: Share how the Indigenous data you work with supports Indigenous Peoples’ right to self-determination
  
  

• Ethics: Centre Indigenous People’s rights and well-being through any data-related work

Best practices for decolonializing data

The following principles can help your Indigenous community support decolonialization and reclaim the control over your data that you deserve.

Cultural heritage institutions that steward Indigenous data may also find these practices helpful as they work to return Indigenous data to Indigenous communities. 

Foster community-led data governance

Establish data governance frameworks that are specific to your Indigenous community’s values and interests.

When partnering with other groups, stipulate that your community must be involved at every stage of the data lifecycle. This includes decision-making around data collection methods, storage protocols, access permissions, and long-term preservation strategies. 

Within the community, consider forming governance committees or councils to oversee any data-related decisions and ensure accountability to its members.

Define protocols and enforce consent

Determine clear protocols for data collection, use, and sharing. The Tribal Resilience Action Database (TRAD) provides helpful guidance, noting that when working with groups outside your community—to respect IDSov—your consent should be free, prior, and informed:

• Free: Empowers your community to consent to or refuse a proposed interaction with your data without negative repercussions
  
  

• Prior: Ensures your community’s consent is obtained before external parties interact with your data
  
  

• Informed: Receive a full picture of why your data is being collected, the intended use, and with whom it will be shared

Implement culturally-appropriate metadata and notices

Consider using Traditional Knowledge (TK) Labels to communicate provenance, consent, and usage rights. Developed in partnership with Indigenous communities, these labels support Indigenous control over data and knowledge. 

TK labels are divided into the following categories:

• Provenance: Identify the primary cultural authority and potentially related interests for the materials in question
  
  

• Protocol: Describe traditional access protocols and encourage respect for those specific to your community
  
  

• Permission: Indicate generally approved usage for your community’s materials

Control access and protect data security

Choose technologies that empower your community to control who accesses its data and how. Look for solutions with granular permissions, so you can define exactly which users are able to view, download, edit, or delete specific records and files.

Before partnering with a vendor, ask about their data security practices and how your information is stored.

It’s also important to understand their level of access. Ensure their system allows you to restrict visibility, so no one outside your community—including vendor staff—can see your data without permission.

Build capacity

Make sure the Indigenous staff or Tribe members who manage your data have the tools they need to feel confident in their work.

Invest in training to support them and provide resources that outline your community’s unique data governance protocols and procedures. These can be created in collaboration with your elders, committees, council, or other appropriate groups.

To further support capacity building, choose solutions that are user-friendly and straightforward to implement. If the systems you select are difficult to learn and use, user adoption will likely suffer.

How Terentia respects Indigenous data sovereignty

As a platform and as a company: Terentia empowers Indigenous Peoples, communities, and institutions to control and manage their data.

By supporting the self-governance of these groups, the Terentia platform and team can help you: 

• Maintain data sovereignty: Store, manage, and share digital heritage on your terms. Protect your data and control access with enterprise-level data privacy, secure access, and user-defined permissions. No one can view your data or files without permission, including the Terentia team.
  
  

• Keep your language alive: Manage and store archival data in your Tribe’s language, including audio files, videos, and other digital assets. Leverage tools to support storing and sharing Tribal languages in digital collections. Automate transcription, metadata entry, and tagging to protect linguistic knowledge for future generations.
  
  

• Store ancestral knowledge: Preserve elders’ stories and oral histories by uploading your digital recordings to Terentia. By ensuring data is only accessible to authorized users and viewers, you can safely manage and protect your Tribal heritage and steward ancestral knowledge with the care it deserves.
  
  

• Reclaim digital heritage: Take ownership of digital assets and ensure your stories, archives, and files are preserved according to your values and ethical protocols. Import Indigenous assets from museums and other institutions, and enrich their metadata with your Tribe’s perspective to restore your cultural authority.
  
  

• Integrate with other platforms: Connect Terentia with other popular software used in the cultural heritage sphere through powerful integrations. Unify your digital ecosystem, improve efficiency, and simplify workflows for those entrusted to care for your data.

Moving forward together

IDSov is fundamental to ethical cultural heritage stewardship. And upholding it is possible through community-created frameworks and technological solutions that support Indigenous data governance, sovereignty, and repatriation. 

Let’s bring your data home to where it rightly belongs—your Indigenous community. 

Ready to explore how to uphold Indigenous data sovereignty? Book a demo with Terentia to explore the platform and its features designed to support IDSov.