Authority control is an expensive process. Various international initiatives exist with the objective of reducing the cost of authority control through co-operation. Such initiatives also contribute significantly to the ease of searching in a heterogeneous environment. Examples of projects include:

Virtual International Authority File (VIAF)

VIAF is a collaborative effort which brings together authority files from national libraries and other organizations so that authority data for a given entity is linked together into a “super” authority record.  It began as a joint project involving Library of Congress, Deutsche Nationalbibliothek, Bibliothèque nationale de France and OCLC. In 2014, contributors included 34 agencies in 27 countries..

LC / NACO Authority File

LC/NAF is an international name authority file maintained by Library of Congress. The LC/NACO authority file contains over 9 million records and involves hundreds of contributing libraries and programmes around the world. It is a core activity of the Program for Cooperative Cataloging