As the Smart Survey Implementation (SSI) project concludes its advanced stage, the European Statistical System stands at an important juncture. The project's work over the past years has not only shown that trusted smart surveys are technically and methodologically feasible, but also that they can offer clear advantages in terms of data quality, operational efficiency, and respondent experience. At the same time, the project has made it equally clear that these benefits are conditional. They rely on robust organizational readiness, legal clarity, technological maturity, and, perhaps most crucially, public trust.
One of the central conclusions of the project is that there is no single “correct” smart survey model. Successful implementations vary depending on the national context, survey topic, and available infrastructure. Some countries may lean more heavily on traditional methods, using smart features as optional add-ons. Others may move toward fully automated data collection using sensors, apps, and machine learning. The future of smart surveys must therefore be approached as a continuum, where NSIs make strategic choices about how “smart” a survey should be, and under what conditions automation should be applied. These choices must balance accuracy, cost-efficiency, respondent burden, and ethical considerations.
Looking ahead, one of the most promising and impactful developments would be the establishment of a shared central smart solution across Europe. This approach, identified in Part 2 of the D1.3 deliverable as “Scenario 4: NSI joins consortium to jointly provide central smart solution”, envisions a joint infrastructure for developing, maintaining, and deploying smart survey components such as microservices for Receipt Scanning and Geolocation. A centralized solution offers significant advantages: it avoids duplication of work, reduces long-term maintenance costs, and promotes methodological and technical harmonization across countries. It could also provide smaller NSIs with access to tools and infrastructure they might not otherwise be able to afford or maintain.
However, implementing such a shared solution comes with real challenges. It requires robust governance, clear legal agreements, and a long-term commitment from both Eurostat and national institutes. Questions about data ownership, system liability, update responsibilities, and cost-sharing must be answered. Yet these challenges are not insurmountable. The experiences of open-source collaboration and code-sharing within the SSI project, especially around the receipt scanning and geolocation microservices, have already laid a solid foundation. A European-wide smart survey ecosystem is achievable, provided there is institutional coordination, sustained funding, and mutual trust.
In parallel to infrastructure, the importance of methodological integration cannot be overstated. As smart features are deployed, NSIs must be able to account for mode effects, validate the accuracy of smart-collected data, and ensure that it can be reliably combined with traditional survey data. The SSI project has contributed valuable tools and frameworks in this area, but much work remains to refine, adapt, and institutionalize these methodologies. Cross-country cooperation in this domain would strengthen data comparability and enable meaningful benchmarking.
Equally important is the need to focus on the respondent perspective. The perception surveys conducted in the project showed that public willingness to participate in smart surveys is shaped by several factors: trust in the NSI, understanding of how the data will be used, perceived burden or effort, and the nature of the smart feature itself. While respondents are often open to using smart features if they understand the benefits (such as convenience or reduced time), concerns around privacy, surveillance, and loss of control remain significant. Future efforts must therefore place user experience and communication at the center of smart survey design. Interfaces should be intuitive, error-tolerant, and transparent. Participants should have clear control over what data is shared, and how it is used.
This also implies the need for continuous improvement cycles, both for the smart technologies and the organizational processes that support them. The PDCA (Plan-Do-Check- Act) cycle proposed within the project is particularly well-suited to guide this process. It ensures that as user needs evolve, technology matures, and legal frameworks shift, smart surveys can remain effective, ethical, and aligned with best practices.
From an operational standpoint, capacity building will be critical. The project revealed that success depends not only on technical innovation, but also on the ability of teams to collaborate across domains—IT, legal, statistical methodology, communication, and data protection. Investing in training, documentation, and shared learning environments will ensure that knowledge and best practices are not lost, but spread across the ESS community. A formalized network or smart survey community, supported by Eurostat or the ESS governance structure, could help institutionalize this exchange and accelerate collective progress.
Finally, the legal and ethical dimension must remain front and center. The modular DPIA approach developed in WP5 offers a flexible way to assess and manage privacy risks across different smart features and survey types. In the future, these modules should evolve into a living legal framework, updated regularly in response to emerging technologies, legal developments, and public expectations. Rather than treating data protection as a compliance burden, NSIs should see it as a design driver—helping to build trust, clarity, and fairness into smart data collection from the outset.
A central pillar for the successful future of smart surveys is the establishment of a robust and forward-looking governance framework, particularly in the context of a shared smart survey infrastructure. The SSI project clearly illustrates that while many technical components, such as microservices, methodological tools, and legal templates, can be developed independently, their full value is only realized when embedded in a coordinated, interoperable, and jointly maintained system. A shared smart solution offers the greatest potential for cost efficiency, consistency, and innovation, especially for countries with limited resources or technical capacity. However, to achieve this, participating NSIs must move beyond ad hoc collaboration and commit to a joint governance structure that defines roles, responsibilities, funding models, update mechanisms, and legal safeguards. Eurostat is ideally positioned to provide leadership in this space, acting as a facilitator, custodian, and coordinator. Such collaboration not only prevents duplication of effort, but also strengthens the integrity and credibility of the European Statistical System as a whole. In a digital age where public trust in data collection is both fragile and vital, a unified approach (technically, legally, and ethically) is not just beneficial, but necessary. Only through shared governance can the vision of scalable, secure, and respondent-friendly smart surveys be sustainably realized across Europe.
In conclusion, the SSI project has provided the European statistical community with a blueprint for moving forward. The key now lies in transforming this blueprint into a working, evolving system—one that is technically sound, legally robust, methodologically rigorous, and trusted by the public. With continued cooperation, investment, and leadership, the vision of a shared, scalable, and sustainable smart survey infrastructure can become a reality—one that supports the production of high-quality, modern statistics for years to come.