Architecture Drivers

Business Goals

• KST Platform should provide easy-to-use modules to enable software vendors to create a data trustee platform with low effort.
• KST Platform should help software developers to adapt a data trustee platform to a specific domain or use case with low effort.

Technical Constraints

• Use Open Source Software whenever possible.

Business Constraints

• First version should be ready in November 2022.
• Final version should be ready by December 2023.
• Two Developer (one Senior, one security engineer).

Key Functional Requirements

[NOTE] This is not a requirements document. Therefore the list is not complete; it contains the key functional requirements only. Requirements which have low or no impact on the architecture are not listed here.

KST Platform should:

• Provide an interface for data providers/ data consumers/ data prosumers to send consent requests.
• Provide means for the data owner to control/restrict the usage of their data (accept/ reject consent requests, and revoke consents).
• Provide an interface for data providers and data prosumers to ingest data.
• Provide an interface for data consumers and data prosumers to retrieve data.
• Provide means to store structured data.
• Provide an interface to add or store meta data for a data item.
• Provide means for data processing.
• Provide means logging of all actions of a data provider, a data consumer, a data prosumer, and a data owner.
• Provide means for the data owner to view the logged actions.
• Provide means for the data owner, the data provider, the data consumer, the data prosumer, and the data trustee operator to authenticate themself.
• Provide a way to store legal and/or contract related information (e.g., consents).

Quality Requirements

• Security: KST Platform should
  • Not prevent the secure storage of sensible data (e.g., not prevent server side encryption and distribution of data over multiple servers)
  • Not prevent the storage and usage of End-To-End encrypted data.
  • Ensure that data is only transferred over a secure channel.
• Legal Compliance: KST Platform should
  • Provide the data owner with means to export their data.
  • Provide the data owner with means to delete/erase their personal data.
• Scalability: KST Platform should
  • Be able to handle at least 1000 data items per user.
  • Be able to handle at least 5000 events per user.
  • Be able to handle at least 500 users per instance.
  • Allow caching of static assets (images, CSS and JavaScript files) of the web frontend.
  • Allow the operation of the system behind a http load balancer.
• Adaptability: KST Platform should
  • Support the configuration of Data Item Types at system startup.
  • Should support the development of domain specific extension services.
• Usability: KST Platform should
  • Provide its functionalities to the data owner via UIs accessible using a web browser (Chrome, Firefox, Edge).
  • Provide its functionalities to the data owner in a user-friendly manner (the functionalities should be understandable without knowledge about the technical details).
• Maintainability: KST Platform should
  • Have a unit statement test coverage of the business logic of at least 50%.
  • Should have a concise and easy to read documentation.
• Auditable: KST Platform should
  • Allow a data owner to audit data related activity within the platform.
  • Allow platform admins to check all data and user activities happening on the platform using the logs.
• Availability: KST Platform should
  • Have a restart time which is not greater then ten seconds.
  • Have automatic health checks to detect faulty instances within 30s.
  • Offer a frontend and a backend that can be run and restarted independently.