DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.8059077
title: Higher Education Institutions in Germany Dataset

description: <strong>Higher Education Institutions in Germany Dataset</strong> This repository contains a dataset of higher education institutions in Germany. This includes 458 higher education institutions in Germany, including universities, universities of applied sciences, colleges of art and music, colleges of public administration, theological universities, and colleges of education.<br> This dataset was compiled in response to a cybersecurity investigation of German higher education institutions' websites [1]. The data is being made publicly available to promote open science principles [2]. <strong>Data</strong> The data includes the following fields for each institution: - Id: A unique identifier assigned to each institution.<br> - Region: The federal state in which the institution is located.<br> - Name: The full name of the institution.<br> - Category: Indicates whether the institution is public or private.<br> - Url: The website of the institution. <strong>Methodology</strong> The methodology for creating the dataset involved obtaining data from two sources: the German federal office for statistics (Destatis)[3] and Hochschulkompass (HSK)[4]. The data from Destatis was obtained by requesting a list of registered HEIs, which was provided in the form of three spreadsheets. The data from these spreadsheets was then split into four CSV files, including a consolidated file that mapped each HEI to its type based on type-implying abbreviations in the name (`heis-mapped.csv`). However, the dataset did not contain website URLs for each HEI, so the URLs were manually obtained by conducting a Google search for each HEI's name and verifying the website using specific indicators. The resulint dataset is in `heis-mapped-url.csv`. The HSK dataset was downloaded from the HSK website and converted to a CSV file. The CSV file was then used to verify the website URLs obtained from the manual collection process. o validate and resolve any differences between the two datasets, a comparison was conducted using an OpenOffice spreadsheet. Funding types were classified into two categories (private and public), and mismatches in HEI types were ignored. Mismatching URLs were checked for redirects to the same destination domain, and mismatches in regions were resolved by checking the address on the website's imprint/contact page. For multiple mismatches, the aforementioned resolutions were applied, thus bringing them down to one difference, making them resolvable again. Overall, this methodology ensured that the German HEIs dataset contains accurate and reliable information about registered HEIs in Germany. The final data was compiled into the dataset included in this repository. <strong>Usage</strong> This data is available under the Creative Commons Zero (CC0) license and can be used for academic research purposes. We encourage the sharing of knowledge and the advancement of research in this field by adhering to open science principles [2]. If you use this data in your research, please cite the source and include a link to this repository. To properly attribute this data, please use the following DOI: <strong>Contribution</strong> If you have any updates or corrections to the data, please feel free to open a pull request or contact us directly. Let's work together to keep this data accurate and up-to-date. <strong>Acknowledgment</strong> We would like to acknowledge the support of the German Rectors' Conference (Hochschulrektorenkonferenz – HRK) for publishing the information used in this dataset. We would like to acknowledge the support of the Norte Portugal Regional Operational Programme (NORTE 2020), under the PORTUGAL 2020 Partnership Agreement, through the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), within the project "Cybers SeC IP" (NORTE-01-0145-FEDER-000044). This study was also developed as part of the Master in Cybersecurity Program at the Polytechnic University of Viana do Castelo, Portugal. <strong>References</strong> 1. Pending.<br> 2. S. Bezjak, A. Clyburne-Sherin, P. Conzett, P. Fernandes, E. Görögh, K. Helbig, B. Kramer, I. Labastida, K. Niemeyer, F. Psomopoulos, T. Ross-Hellauer, R. Schneider, J. Tennant, E. Verbakel, H. Brinken, and L. Heller, Open Science Training Handbook. Zenodo, Apr. 2018. [Online]. Available: [https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.1212496]<br> 3. German federal office for statistics, "Startseite - Statistisches Bundesamt", Jan 2023. [online]. Available: [https://www.destatis.de/](https://www.destatis.de/)<br> 4. Higher Education Compass, "Higher Education Institutions - Downloads", Jan 2023. [online]. Available: [https://www.hochschulkompass.de/en/higher-education-institutions/downloads.html](https://www.hochschulkompass.de/en/higher-education-institutions/downloads.html)