Provenance Information in the Web of Data

Olaf Hartig

2009 · 182 citations · 19 references

Concepts

TL;DR

The Web’s openness and ease of linking data create challenges that require evaluating quality and trustworthiness, and provenance analysis is a common approach to address these issues. The paper proposes a provenance model for Web data, identifies ways to obtain provenance information, and highlights open questions about publishing provenance metadata. The authors present a provenance model that extends traditional creation-focused provenance to include data access, and outline methods for obtaining provenance information.

Abstract

The openness of the Web and the ease to combine linked data from dierent sources creates new challenges. Systems that consume linked data must evaluate quality and trustworthiness of the data. A common approach for data quality assessment is the analysis of provenance information. For this reason, this paper discusses provenance of data on the Web and proposes a suitable provenance model. While traditional provenance research usually addresses the creation of data, our provenance model also represents data access, a dimension of provenance that is particularly relevant in the context of Web data. Based on our model we identify options to obtain provenance information and we raise open questions concerning the publication of provenance-related metadata for linked data on the Web.

References

19