The ABCD standard (Access to Biological Collection Data) is used widely in Europe and occasionally on other continents for providing primary biodiversity information from natural history specimen collections, living collections or observation databases into biodiversity networks such as GBIF (Global Biodiversity Information Facility) and BioCASe (Biological Collection Access Service). In conjunction with its reference implementation, the BioCASe Provider Software, it currently accounts for roughly 29 million records shared with GBIF. Projects and Special Interest Networks like the Australian Virtual Herbarium, OpenUp!, GeoCASe and the DNA Bank Network rely on ABCD; two extensions have been created so far (Extension for Geosciences, EFG, and ABCD-DNA).

This short presentation will summarize the basic approach for publishing biodiversity information with BioCASe and ABCD and the standards and protocols used. An overview over existing special interest networks based on this technology will be given, including the ABCD extensions created for these.