NECROPOLIS UNITED is developing an integrated, sustainable, non-extractive and open-source database that inventories reported dead refugees in Europe. It is integrating and updating source data from three different databases, each providing a fragmented dataset, with specific metadata: the list compiled by UNITED Against Racism (data from 44,764 reported deaths, period 1993-2021), the Missing Migrants Project (MMP) of the IOM (International Organization for Migration) (more than 35,000 reported deaths, as of 2013) and the Deaths at the Border Database (DBD) developed within a completed research project at the Vrije Universiteit of Amsterdam (1990-2013). These source data are fragmented and have varying metadata and user modes. There is also no platform available for comparative research. NECROPOLIS UNITED updates and integrates this source data and also develops a sustainable information system that keeps the database up-to-date. This information system was developed in dialogue with José Pablo Baraybar do Carmo, forensic coordinator of the ICRC (International Committee of the Red Cross). ICRC created "Track the Face," an in-country initiative that mobilizes and assists family members of missing and dead refugees in gathering information. The information set-up gives agency to those involved, regarding the/their data, and the technologies used.
Type: Equipment, E-resource
Location type: Single sited
Accessibility: Everyone
User modalities: <p> The database and information system of Necropolis united will be freely accessible (Open Access). While it will be used to support research projects of the consortium members, it will also be available to other researchers and human rights activists worldwide. Promotion at an international level will enable international researchers to use and contribute to the information system. The UNITED list, which forms the backbone of the infrastructure, has already attracted interest from several other research groups such as the group of Thomas Spijkeboer at the UvA, external expert Philippe Rekacewicz (University of Helsinki, Radical Cartography research group, Timmy De Laet, UA, research group Visual Poetics, ...). The estimated usage time of the interested parties and target groups is as follows: <br> <br>60% usage time for the consortium's own research groups <br>20% usage time for other research groups within the consortium institutions <br>10% usage time for external research groups <br>10 % usage time for third parties (e.g. companies) <br>= 100% total amount of estimated usage time </p>
In use: 1 Jan 2026 → Today
Disciplines: Performance studies, Ethnicity and migration studies, Choreography, Performance, Human rights law, Urban and regional geography, Interactive media, Urban anthropology
Keywords: cultural antropology, augmented humanities, performance, migrant deaths, radical cartography
