US Census Bureau Head Fends Off Critics of ‘Differential Privacy’ Tool

The US Census Bureau’s chief Robert Santos has openly highlighted the benefits of a tool called ‘differential privacy’ created to protect participants’ data in the statistical agency’s questionnaires.

Countering a letter by critics seen by AP earlier this week, Santos defended differential privacy against prominent researchers who suggested it undermines the usefulness of numbers gathered through the agency’s efforts.

The solution essentially anonymizes participants’ survey results data by adding intentional errors to prevent third-party companies from effectively piecing together identities.

This is particularly effective at the smallest geographies, such as census blocks, with critics suggesting that thousands of small jurisdictions throughout the US will not get usable data because of the algorithms applied to the numbers to protect confidentiality.

The demographers and academic researchers also highlighted that census data is responsible for allocating $1.5tn in federal funding each year, particularly for assessing how many congressional seats every state gets and for redrawing political districts.

Conversely, the incomplete identification of this data could lead to delays and inaccuracies, potentially also leading to incorrectly determining political power.

“The Census Bureau risks failing its responsibilities as a federal statistical agency to provide relevant, accurate, timely, and credible information for the public good,” the critics said. “The experience of the last few years has undermined user trust in the Census Bureau.”

Infosecurity has reached out to the Census Bureau to ask about the office’s response to the letter.

The news comes amidst a new privacy push in the United States. As cyber law analyst Scott Allendevaux writes, California and Virginia have only a few more weeks to update their data protection program to prepare for upcoming legislation.

More recently, the statistical agency’s watchdog said the Census Bureau had failed to stop simulated cyber-attacks it had conducted as part of a covert operation to test its cybersecurity vulnerabilities.

The Bureau replied that, despite that, the operation had served to improve its overall cybersecurity posture.