Expert Meeting on Statistical Data Confidentiality

Statistical institutes face a major challenge when transitioning from suppressive to perturbative disclosure control methods: how to objectively calibrate protection parameters. While the Cell Key Method (CKM) effectively protects frequency tables by adding controlled noise, selecting optimal parameters remains a serious challenge. We present an evidence-based framework for calibrating CKM's...

Data in tables published for the Swedish R&D survey in the business enterprise sector (BERD) were previously protected by cell suppression to prevent disclosure of sensitive information. In order to avoid cell suppression, key respondents were asked to sign waivers allowing the publication of their data. However, consent was rarely given to disseminate cells where an enterprise’s data...

The package τ-Argus is a widely used EU-funded Open Source tool for disclosure control in tabular data. It is automatable via batch functionality, and as Open Source package it is supposed to be easy to adapt, and transparent. As there is growing demand for specific τ-ARGUS functionalities to be provided “as a service”, the paper will discuss pros and cons of a fundamental revision of the...

In many countries, perturbative methods are increasingly used as a privacy protection method for official statistics. The U.S. Census Bureau has applied the mechanism of differential privacy, specifically Zero-Concentrated Differential Privacy (zCDP) during the creation of statistical tables created based on data from the 2020 Census as well as Privacy-Protected Microdata Files (PPMFs) as a...

The Cell Key Method (CKM) is commonly used by statistics agencies to release tabular data. This paper compares the utility of a new open-source synthetic data tool, SynDiffix, with CKM for very fine-grained geographic data. SynDiffix is designed to have strong anonymity even when used by non-experts, and aims for high accuracy while maintaining strong anonymity. We compare the utility of...

The presentation outlines the practical application and evaluation of the targeted record swapping (TRS) method in the context of the 2021 Polish Census (NSP2021), specifically for population data dissemination within a 1 km² grid framework. The method, recommended by Eurostat, was employed to address statistical disclosure control (SDC) requirements while preserving data utility. The talk...

Limitation of statistical disclosure, while preserving utility and accuracy, by using standard methods is the pragmatic goal for official statistics while differential privacy is regarded as a practical goal for technological institutions which use or even stream data and involve open-source tools and libraries.
In this paper we explore the potential of using Bayesian methods to both estimate...