Computer scientists have recently undermined our faith in the
privacy-protecting power of anonymization, the name for techniques for
protecting the privacy of individuals in large databases by deleting
information like names and social security numbers. These scientists
have demonstrated they can often “reidentify” or “deanonymize” individuals
hidden in anonymized data with astonishing ease. By understanding
this research, we will realize we have made a mistake, labored beneath
a fundamental misunderstanding, which has assured us much less
privacy than we have assumed. This mistake pervades nearly every
information privacy law, regulation, and debate, yet regulators and legal
scholars have paid it scant attention. We must respond to the surprising
failure of anonymization, and this Article provides the tools to do so.
%0 Unpublished Work
%1 ohm2009broken
%A Ohm, Paul
%D 2009
%K anonymization broken failure mt privacy promises
%T Broken Promises of Privacy: Responding to the Surprising Failure of Anonymization
%U papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1450006
%X Computer scientists have recently undermined our faith in the
privacy-protecting power of anonymization, the name for techniques for
protecting the privacy of individuals in large databases by deleting
information like names and social security numbers. These scientists
have demonstrated they can often “reidentify” or “deanonymize” individuals
hidden in anonymized data with astonishing ease. By understanding
this research, we will realize we have made a mistake, labored beneath
a fundamental misunderstanding, which has assured us much less
privacy than we have assumed. This mistake pervades nearly every
information privacy law, regulation, and debate, yet regulators and legal
scholars have paid it scant attention. We must respond to the surprising
failure of anonymization, and this Article provides the tools to do so.
@unpublished{ohm2009broken,
abstract = {Computer scientists have recently undermined our faith in the
privacy-protecting power of anonymization, the name for techniques for
protecting the privacy of individuals in large databases by deleting
information like names and social security numbers. These scientists
have demonstrated they can often “reidentify” or “deanonymize” individuals
hidden in anonymized data with astonishing ease. By understanding
this research, we will realize we have made a mistake, labored beneath
a fundamental misunderstanding, which has assured us much less
privacy than we have assumed. This mistake pervades nearly every
information privacy law, regulation, and debate, yet regulators and legal
scholars have paid it scant attention. We must respond to the surprising
failure of anonymization, and this Article provides the tools to do so.},
added-at = {2009-11-24T09:05:15.000+0100},
author = {Ohm, Paul},
biburl = {https://www.bibsonomy.org/bibtex/2213f7022da5e907a2226ada208a2f9e7/ghp09},
interhash = {e5f5be1dfe3d7da207c058591e18f58f},
intrahash = {213f7022da5e907a2226ada208a2f9e7},
keywords = {anonymization broken failure mt privacy promises},
month = Aug,
note = {working draft},
timestamp = {2009-11-24T09:05:15.000+0100},
title = {Broken Promises of Privacy: Responding to the Surprising Failure of Anonymization},
url = {papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1450006},
year = 2009
}