University digital repositories: frameworks for evaluating and integrating TRUST, Zero Trust, and FAIR principles
Keywords:
Ciencia abierta; TRUST; Zero Trust; FAIR; repositarios universitario; preservación digital.Abstract
University digital repositories (UDRs) have become critical infrastructure for open science by enabling long-term preservation, visibility and interoperability of scholarly outputs. Yet repository maturity goes beyond technical deployment: it requires assessment frameworks that combine policy, metadata quality, preservation, user experience, and crucially trust and security. This paper undertakes a documentary review and comparative analysis of leading repository assessment instruments (e.g., DINI, RECOLECTA-FECYT, OpenAIRE, COAR, CoreTrustSeal and ISO 16363), and proposes an integrated indicator matrix tailored to university repositories. The main contribution is an operational convergence of three complementary approaches: (i) TRUST as principles for repository transparency, responsibility, user focus, sustainability and technology; (ii) Zero Trust as a cybersecurity paradigm grounded in continuous verification and least privilege; and (iii) FAIR as guiding principles to enhance findability, accessibility, interoperability and reuse of digital objects. Results synthesize actionable dimensions, criteria and indicators and provide a comparative table linking TRUST–Zero Trust–FAIR to governance, preservation and security practices.
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Copyright (c) 2026 Maria Teresa Sánchez Rivera, Ailín Martínez-Rodríguez, Zoia Rivera, Javier Ramón Santovenia-Diaz, Carlos Rivero Torres
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