diff --git a/scripts/import-legacy-db/.gitignore b/scripts/import-legacy-db/.gitignore
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+*
+!import-legacy-db.sh
+!README.md
+!.gitignore
diff --git a/scripts/import-legacy-db/README.md b/scripts/import-legacy-db/README.md
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+# MongoDB scripts 
+
+This README explains how to directly access the production or staging database
+for backup or query purposes.
+
+## Backup script
+
+The backup script is intended to be used as a cron job or as a single command from your laptop.
+It uses SSH tunneling to a remote host and dumps the mongo database on your machine.
+Therefore, a public SSH key needs to be copied to the remote machine.
+
+### Usage
+
+All parameters must be supplied as environment variables:
+
+| Name                  | required  |
+|-----------------------|-----------|
+| SSH\_USERNAME         | yes       |
+| SSH\_HOST             | yes       |
+| MONGODB\_USERNAME     | yes       |
+| MONGODB\_PASSWORD     | yes       |
+| MONGODB\_DATABASE     | yes       |
+| NEO4J\_USER           | yes       |
+| NEO4J\_PASSWORD       | yes       |
+| OUTPUT                |           |
+| GPG\_PASSWORD         |           |
+
+If you set `GPG_PASSWORD`, the resulting archive will be encrypted (symmetrically, with the given passphrase).
+This is recommended if you dump the database on your personal laptop because of data security.
+
+After exporting these environment variables to your bash, run:
+
+```bash
+./import-legacy-db.sh
+```
+
+
+### Import into your local mongo db (optional)
+
+Run (but change the file name accordingly):
+```bash
+mongorestore --gzip --archive=human-connection-dump_2018-11-21.archive
+```
+
+If you previously encrypted your dump, run:
+```bash
+gpg --decrypt human-connection-dump_2018-11-21.archive.gpg | mongorestore --gzip --archive
+```
+
+
+## Query remote MongoDB
+
+In contrast to the backup script, querying the database is expected to be done
+interactively and on demand by the user. Therefore our suggestion is to use a
+tool like [MongoDB compass](https://www.mongodb.com/products/compass) to query
+the mongo db through an SSH tunnel. This tool can export a collection as .csv
+file and you can further do custom processing with a csv tool like
+[q](https://github.com/harelba/q).
+
+### Suggested workflow
+
+Read on the mongodb compass documentation how to connect to the remote mongo
+database [through SSH](https://docs.mongodb.com/compass/master/connect/). You
+will need all the credentials and a public SSH key on the server as for the
+backup script above.
+
+Once you have a connection, use the MongoDB Compass
+[query bar](https://docs.mongodb.com/compass/master/query-bar/) to query for the
+desired data. You can
+[export the result](https://docs.mongodb.com/compass/master/import-export/) as 
+.json or .csv.
+
+Once you have the .csv file on your machine, use standard SQL queries through
+the command line tool q to further process the data.
+
+For example
+```sh
+q "SELECT email FROM ./invites.csv INTERSECT SELECT email FROM ./emails.csv" -H --delimiter=,
+```
+
+[Q's website](http://harelba.github.io/q/usage.html) explains the usage fairly
+well.
diff --git a/scripts/import-legacy-db/import-legacy-db.sh b/scripts/import-legacy-db/import-legacy-db.sh
new file mode 100755
index 000000000..263ea9a53
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+++ b/scripts/import-legacy-db/import-legacy-db.sh
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+#!/bin/bash
+
+for var in "SSH_USERNAME" "SSH_HOST" "MONGODB_USERNAME" "MONGODB_PASSWORD" "MONGODB_DATABASE" "NEO4J_USER" "NEO4J_PASSWORD"
+do
+  if [[ -z "${!var}" ]]; then
+    echo "${var} is undefined"
+    exit -1
+  fi
+done
+
+OUTPUT_FILE_NAME=${OUTPUT:-human-connection-dump}_$(date -I).archive
+
+echo "SSH_USERNAME             ${SSH_USERNAME}"
+echo "SSH_HOST                 ${SSH_HOST}"
+echo "MONGODB_USERNAME         ${MONGODB_USERNAME}"
+echo "MONGODB_PASSWORD         ${MONGODB_PASSWORD}"
+echo "MONGODB_DATABASE         ${MONGODB_DATABASE}"
+echo "NEO4J_USER               ${NEO4J_USER}"
+echo "NEO4J_PASSWORD           ${NEO4J_PASSWORD}"
+echo "OUTPUT_FILE_NAME         ${OUTPUT_FILE_NAME}"
+echo "GPG_PASSWORD             ${GPG_PASSWORD:-<none>}"
+echo "-------------------------------------------------"
+
+ssh -M -S my-ctrl-socket -fnNT -L 27018:localhost:27017 -l ${SSH_USERNAME} ${SSH_HOST}
+
+if [[ -z "${!GPG_PASSWORD}" ]]; then
+  mongodump --host localhost -d ${MONGODB_DATABASE} --port 27018 --username ${MONGODB_USERNAME} --password ${MONGODB_PASSWORD} --authenticationDatabase admin --gzip --archive | gpg -c --batch --passphrase ${GPG_PASSWORD} --output ${OUTPUT_FILE_NAME}.gpg
+else
+  mongodump --host localhost -d ${MONGODB_DATABASE} --port 27018 --username ${MONGODB_USERNAME} --password ${MONGODB_PASSWORD} --authenticationDatabase admin --gzip --archive=${OUTPUT_FILE_NAME}
+fi
+
+
+ssh -S my-ctrl-socket -O check -l ${SSH_USERNAME} ${SSH_HOST}
+ssh -S my-ctrl-socket -O exit  -l ${SSH_USERNAME} ${SSH_HOST}
+
+
+