Web archiving: definitions, strategies, flows, and initiatives

Abstract

Introduction: The importance of web archiving is to preserve and provide long-term access to digital information published on the internet. With the increasing amount of digital content, there is a real risk that valuable information will be lost, corrupted or become inaccessible, due to technological changes, platform upgrades, or even accidental or intentional deletions. Web archiving is essential for digital preservation and continuous access to institutional information, ensuring the availability, reliability, and continuity of society's digital heritage, and for advancing research, education, transparency, and preservation of digital history. Objective: To present the theme, defining web archiving, showing how the process is done, the strategies, flows, and international and national initiatives, among them, the ARQUIWEB project, from the Instituto Brasileiro de Informação em Ciência e Tecnologia (IBICT) e da Rede Cariniana. Methodology: Descriptive exploratory research, using the E-LIS data repository and other sources, through the expression initiatives and strategies for archiving the web, both in Portuguese and in English. Results: Seven international initiatives were presented in various contexts (national libraries and archives, governmental and non-profit organizations), and two national ones, where ARQUIWEB stands out, which will archive sites of partners and governmental institutions. Conclusion: National web archiving initiatives are still incipient, compared to international ones, which shows study possibilities and the importance of establishing policies, having strategies, and following flows for web archiving in institutions, guaranteeing quality in the collection and in the result.