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Federal data producers are becoming more concerned about
confidentiality. As a result, data producing agencies increasingly limit
access to data or use statistical techniques to make identification of
individuals unlikely. These disclosure limitation techniques can have
a dramatically negative impact on the research utility of public-use data.
APDU members have expressed concern that these protective measures have
gone too far and that more creative solutions need to be developed. APDU
can be a valuable voice for users in this national debate concerning the
appropriate balance between data access and confidentiality of individual
data.
In response to member concerns about confidentiality and
data access, the APDU board created the Task Force on Confidentiality
(APDU-TFC). The APDU-TFC is charged with educating public data users on
the related issues of confidentiality and access. This includes the legislative
and statutory environment as well as technical issues related to the appropriate
use of aggregate and local area statistics and public-use microdata files
(including files that have been statistically altered to limit the probability
of recovering an individual's identity). The task force is also charged
with communicating the needs of public data users to government agencies
that collect and disseminate data to the public. In developing this website,
our objective is to facilitate member education and provide a forum for
eliciting and sharing members data needs to data producers.
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