The curated data and code published via GFZ Data Services will be persistently archived for the long term and assigned with digital object identifier (DOI) aiming to provide reusable data and software. An additional backup of the data is provided by the IT Services and Operation group of GFZ. 

The metadata for data discovery that are collected via the metadata editor is send to the DOI registration agency DataCite and openly provided via the OAI-PMH interface of GFZ Data Services. The metadata are complemented by additional technical documentation. Information on the use of personal data is provided in the Data Protection Declaration.

The data curation by the team of GFZ Data Services includes editorial edits of the metadata, the data description and the data with feedback loops between researcher and curator. Although efforts are made to ensure the quality of the data and metadata, we cannot guarantee that they contain no errors. Therefore, the data available via GFZ Data Services are provided without warranty of any kind.

All data and software are provided with a licence that is indicated on the DOI Landing Pages. Generally we recommend the use open international licences (Creative Commons for data, Open Source licences for software). Metadata are in the public domain.

To recognise the important role of the data providers, data users should formally recognise data providers, contributors and sources by citing them appropriately. Data with assigned DOI are citable as any other scientific article. The recommended citation for each dataset follows the recommendations of DataCite and is given in the top section of the DOI Landing Pages.