Unlocking Web Data for Research: Legal and Technical Foundations for Web Scraping

Project Summary

Research in the Social Sciences and Humanities increasingly depends on web data. However, a lack of technical skills, legal uncertainty, and unclear institutional guidance often block such progress. This project aims to instruct researchers and administrators at knowledge institutions on how to use web data (through web scraping) in an ethical, legal, and responsible way. By addressing this gap, the results will enable researchers to carry out innovative research with confidence, ensuring that their use of web data is transparent, FAIR, and socially responsible.

Project Team

• Maliheh Mahlouji (Project Lead), Tilburg University
• Johannes Boegershausen, Erasmus University Rotterdam
• Anne Brouwer, Tilburg University
• Hannes Datta, Tilburg University
• Jacques Flores, Utrecht University
• Simon Geiregat, Tilburg University
• Catalina Goanta, Utrecht University
• Rimma Grishmanovskaya, Tilburg University
• Richard Haans, Erasmus University Rotterdam
• Mirko Tobias Schäfer, Utrecht University
• Sanne Janssen, Utrecht University
• Nivedha Narayanaswamy, Tilburg University

Keywords

Web Scraping, Technical Training, Legal Framework, Social Science & Humanities Research, FAIR data

The above projects have gone through the TDCC-SSH Challenge Call 2025 process.

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