DIN 19461: A National Standard for Derived Text Formats

Abstract

We present DIN 19461:2026-06 (E), a German draft national standard that defines categories, terminology, and process requirements for Derived Text Formats (DTFs) created from text documents in natural language. The standard specifies enrichment and information reduction operations, requirements for combining multiple DTFs, and documentation obligations for publication, archiving, and reuse. Its aim is to enable legally compliant sharing and analysis of texts–especially where copyright or data protection prevents distributing originals–while maintaining scientific utility and reproducibility through explicit process and parameter recording. We outline the scope, the key concepts, the four core reduction operations (retain, delete, replace, randomise), together with examples across token-, structure-, and vector-based DTFs, and implications for infrastructures (e.g., ISO 24622-based metadata). Finally, we discuss limitations, open questions (e.g., reconstruction risks with modern ML models), and next steps for adoption and maintenance.

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