Researchers are increasingly required by funders, science bodies and publishers, including this journal's publisher, to demonstrate openness and transparency in their research, and to make research data available for future reuse. Taking the Drugs and (dis)order project as a case, we show the practical steps that researchers can take to navigate the complexities of sharing sensitive qualitative research data and making them available as evidence of transparency and for future reuse. Our data deal with sensitive and illicit activities, studying drug economies in the context of war to peace transitions in Afghanistan, Colombia and Myanmar. Non-secure handling of the data may put research participants and researchers at risk. The approach taken focuses in a first instance on secure handling of all data during the research, providing secure systems for storage and transfer, and de-identifying collected data. An Ethics and Security panel discusses research ethics to find synergies and compromises. Consent procedures take future reuse into account. Rich metadata are captured and created to as contextual information for future reuse of data. Trusted data repositories that specialise in qualitative data provide a solution for ethical sharing and reuse of data.
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