FAQ

UNIGE provides an ethical risk declaration form to help project leaders determine whether specific measures should be considered.

As of 1 January 2026, this self-assessment form must be completed by the person responsible for the project before the launch of any new research project. The purpose of the form is to inform and raise awareness among project leaders about the administrative steps that may need to be taken in advance, and to help identify the institutional services they can contact for support and guidance.;

If a data reuse agreement concerns a specific project led by a single person, and does not commit the Faculty or the institution, it must be signed by the project supervisor.

In all other cases, please refer to the relevant Memento article on Concluding collaborative research agreements and service mandates.

Questionnaires and forms used to collect research data are increasingly expected to be shared alongside the data themselves. As there is usually no dedicated tool for this type of resource, they are commonly shared through data repositories.

For example, you can deposit your questionnaire in Yareta, UNIGE’s data repository, by selecting “Reference” as the data type.

The retention period for research data depends on the nature of the data and the applicable regulatory framework.

At UNIGE, research data must be stored securely for at least five years after the end of the project, in accordance with section 2.6, “Primary data”, of the Directive Intégrité dans la recherche scientifique. If the person responsible for the project leaves the University before the end of this period, they must ensure that the data continues to be stored appropriately.

Personal data, however, must be destroyed as soon as it is no longer necessary for the conduct of the project, in accordance with Article 10 of LIPAD.

The Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) also recommends a minimum retention period of 10 years for research data, although this may vary depending on the discipline or type of data. See the SNSF FAQ, letter o, “Preservation and long-term storage of research data".

For more information on long term preservation options, see Archiving solutions at UNIGE.

The University of Geneva does not provide REDCap for surveys. Instead, it offers an institutional LimeSurvey platform, which can be used to collect data, including highly sensitive data.

You can request access to LimeSurvey UNIGE using the online request form. Documentation and a user guide (in french only) are also available.

For any request related to REDCap, please contact the HUG using their request form.

Corv, an audio and video transcription tool developed by UNIL, is now available to the University of Geneva community. This solution has been designed to meet institutional needs and is currently available as a test version. Its interface and transcription results may therefore still evolve.

Access Corv

The service is suitable for processing personal data, including sensitive personal data.

To use Corv, you must either be connected to the UNIGE network or use the VPN.

No.

If your project only uses scientific publications or freely available documents, such as legal scholarship, legislation or case law, it does not generally produce research data separate from the publications resulting from the project. In this case, a DMP is not required. The bibliographic references included in the project’s publications are sufficient to identify the sources used.

However, if the project generates additional information, such as comparative tables, a database linking different documents, or any other derived dataset, a DMP is required, as the sharing of this information must then be considered.

No. The Library’s training sessions on research data, offered as part of the Rendez-vous de l’info scientifique, are not recorded.

However, short videos produced by Data Science 4 All are available on Media Server for UNIGE members.

UNIGE staff and enrolled students have access to all University storage tools, regardless of where they live, including abroad.

For research data storage, the academic NAS is the recommended solution. It can be accessed from outside the University using the VPN or the Omnissa Horizon VDI Client.

UNIGE OneDrive can also be used with a UNIGE institutional account, but it is not recommended for research data.

Any request for access to data collected by HUG should be submitted to the HUG InfoDesk.

Requests can be submitted either through the eProcess InfoDesk form on the HUG intranet: Shortcuts tab > eProcess > search for “Infodesk”, or by logging in to the HUG website and following the procedure below:

Requests to extract clinical data for research purposes from “HUG data” must be sent to HUG by email at: Datamanager.CRC(at)hug.ch