Many of us learned at school that data is the plural form of datum in Latin. Other words of Latin origin are memorandum and biennium. When we use them in English, we anglicize them and they do not follow Latin rules. We don’t use the singular form of datum. We only use data.
In the case of data, we actually have two possible forms in English, depending on the meaning of the word.
If it means information then it is considered as a singular noun.
If it means scientific or technical data, it is plural. Statisticians may say ‘the data are’, but only in a technical sense.
However, journalists generally use the singular, and the most common usage of data nowadays is in the singular.
In United Nations style, however, data always takes a plural verb. When writing official documents, you need to follow the UN style rule.
Examples from a BBC article:
Data is processed and housed in data centres.
But most data in the world is not this kind of data.
When in doubt, consult your style guide or dictionary!
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Author: Carol Waites
Presentation/editing by Christina O’Shaughnessy
https://worldwidewriting.org/
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Carol Waites (PhD)
Email: carolswritingtips@gmail.com
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Carol’s memoir of her times at the United Nations, Behind the Flags, is available on Amazon and lulu.com
ISBN 9783952632703 Behind the Flags Amazon
9783952632710 Behind the Flags Black and White Version Amazon (Australia and Japan)
9783952632727 Behind the Flags lulu.com
It is also available for sale in the UN bookshop at the Pregny entry in Geneva.