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Retainment plan

If your research project uses an IT system or a cloud service not provided by the University, you need to draw up a retainment plan that describes how the data in the project will be managed from an archival perspective.


Plan for retainment and disposal of information

If you use an IT system or a cloud service that is new for Umeå University, you need to draw up a retainment plan when first setting this system or service up. The retainment plan describes how information in the system could be retained or disposed of. Failure to plan for retainment and disposal of data risks resulting in documents being locked into systems without the ability to export them. This, in turn, can mean unnecessary costs for keeping outdated systems running or building expensive extraction solutions afterwards.

The purpose of the retainment plan is thus to be able to prepare for the decommissioning of a system and avoid the loss or destruction of data that need to be retained. The system owner is responsible for drawing up a retainment plan.

If you only use IT systems or IT services provided by the University, you do not need to draw up a retainment plan.

Information on Aktum regarding retainment of electronic documents in systems (UMU ID required)

Reuse information from other plans

In the retainment plan, you must fill in a lot of information that also appears in your information classification, risk and vulnerability analysis and data management plan. If you reuse the information you have already filled in, you avoid both duplication of work and conflicting information.

More information about planning your data management

Do you have questions about research data?

The University has a cross-functional team that supports you with research data issues in areas such as archiving, legal affairs, IT support, open data, and information security. You can contact the research data support team using the following form:

Contact the research data support team if you have questions

Latest update: 2025-06-05

Read more about data management and archiving

Informationssymbol

About research data

The data you collect are official documents and can be requested by third-parties.

A hand is picking out an ID card from a computer screen.

Security awareness

There are many different ways that your information can be exposed to security risks.

En ikon som visualiserar bevarande av data

Archiving your research material

Definition of the most common concepts in archiving and frequently asked questions.