kohdedata

Kohdedata is a term used in data management to describe datasets that contain information about targets—entities that are the focus of analysis, segmentation, or outreach. The word stems from the Finnish kohde, meaning target, and in some Nordic contexts it is used to distinguish target data from source data or metadata. The term is not a formal standard in international data-literature, and its precise scope can vary by organization.

Typical components include unique target identifiers, attributes describing the targets (demographics, behavior, or operational metrics), provenance metadata (when and how the data were collected), quality indicators, and linking keys to other data sources. Kohdedata may be generated from customer records, sensor streams, event logs, or external data feeds and is used to drive analytics, segmentation, personalized outreach, forecasting, or resource planning.

Governance and ethics: because kohdedata can include personal or sensitive information, its handling is governed by data protection laws such as the European GDPR, along with organizational policies on access control, retention, and auditing. Data quality, lineage, and de-identification practices are emphasized to ensure reproducibility and privacy. Limitations include potential biases in target definitions and the risk of overfitting analyses to specific target groups.

Related topics include data governance, data quality, privacy, data lineage, and customer data platforms.