Access to and processing of microdata is increasingly important to researchers undertaking in-depth analyses for research, policy formulation and evaluation. Researchers in universities, government departments and agencies and in the private and public sectors all use microdata from a range of sources to help them answer their research questions.

Many National Statistical Organisations (NSOs) and statistical agencies release microdata to researchers but all regulate microdata access in order to protect the confidentiality of individuals and organisations that have provided the data. Regulation of access is also subject to the legal requirements in each NSO's jurisdiction.

Internationally, NSOs provide researchers with access to microdata through a range of technical means. Some provide remote processing of microdata via the Web. Others provide microdata files on CD-ROM or DVD, and many provide access on their own premises in data labs. A few provide all these solutions, some provide one or more, and others are planning such developments. Some NSOs are legally required to restrict access to certain categories of users.

Historically, some NSOs have independently developed various statistical technologies and then shared them with others (for example Statistics Netherlands' Blaise). Another emerging approach is to plan a collaborative development right from the start. However, different strategies are required to create technologies that can be shared from the outset than for those developed by individual NSOs and shared later on.

In May 2009, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the Australian Bureau of Statistics organised a Workshop to determine whether there was:

1. scope for international collaboration to develop a new tool that could be used by multiple NSOs to provide processing of microdata
2. agreement to set up an international task force to pool resources to develop such a tool and if so,
3. to reach broad agreement on a governance and business model for such development; and
4. to reach agreement on future work programs for collaborative development.

At the Workshop the participants agreed to a series of Actions and to form an ongoing working group on Microdata Access.