The European XFEL is a megahertz repetition-rate facility producing extremely bright and coherent pulses of duration of the order of few femtoseconds or less. Owing to its X-ray imagers, specifically built to operate at these repetition rates (AGIPD, DSSC and LPD), the amount of data generated in the context of user experiments can exceed hundreds of gigabits per second, resulting in tens of petabytes stored every year. These rates and volumes pose significant challenges both for the facility and its users. In fact, if unaddressed, extraction and interpretation of scientific content is hindered, and investments and operational costs quickly becomes unsustainable