A Roadmap for Disclosure Avoidance in the Survey of Income and Program Participation (2024) / Chapter Skim
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1 Introduction
1 Introduction
Pages 15-28
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From page 15... ...
During World War I, census records were used to support the military draft, despite President Taft's earlier promises of confidentiality. Protections added in 1940 were overturned by the Second War Powers Act in 1942 (though it expired in 1947)
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As a practical matter, promising privacy is also a valuable tool for reassuring survey respondents that they may safely provide accurate information, affecting both survey response rates and data quality. Yet what is needed to protect confidentiality?
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In a census, it is readily apparent which combinations of characteristics will uniquely identify individuals; in a sample survey such as SIPP, one can use a small set of attributes to uniquely identify individuals among the survey respondents, but it is less clear whether those same attributes are unique within the entire population. The use of sampling does not change whether a particular combination of characteristics is unique, but it changes whether one can know that the combination uniquely identifies an individual in the population.
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Modern technology and statistical methods, combined with transparency and a strong legal framework, create the opportunity to use data for evidence-building in ways that were not possible in the past. STATEMENT OF TASK To determine the most appropriate disclosure avoidance procedures to use for SIPP, the Census Bureau asked the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine to convene an expert panel consisting of experts in statistics, survey methodology, economics, computer and data science, policy evaluation, and sociology.
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the need for protecting the confidentiality of SIPP data, potentially across multiple data releases, while providing timely access for the many re search uses of SIPP. The panel will produce a report with conclusions and recommendations for disclosure protection and data provision from the SIPP program.
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The panel next examined what information it needed to address the statement of task. Collectively, the panel members brought experience and expertise in working with SIPP data and in disclosure avoidance approaches (including traditional techniques, controlled virtual access, synthetic data, and differential privacy)
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They also covered SIPP uses of administrative data during production processing; background on SIPP synthetic data and numbers and types of users; SIPP's current and desired level of security; new developments within the Census Bureau on disclosure limitations; SIPP small area estimation, key estimates, and data quality; and a recent re-identification study conducted by the Census Bureau relating to SIPP. The panel conducted multiple literature searches to identify the uses of SIPP, focusing on four search methods: (1)
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An Analysis of Synthetic Census Bureau Earnings Using Survey Responses and Administrative Records 9/7/22 Synthetic Data and Census Bureau Jerry Reiter -- Duke University Directions for Privacy Protection 10/3/22 Statistics and Privacy danah boyd -- Microsoft Research and Georgetown University 10/3/22 SIPP User Experiences Bradford Chaney -- National Academies 11/14/22 A Modern Container-based Approach Lars Vilhuber -- Cornell University for Development of and Access to Confidential Data 11/14/22 Differential Privacy Salil Vadhan -- Harvard University 12/12/22 Restricted Data Access at Inter- Amy Pienta -- University of Michigan university Consortium of Political and Social Research 3/21/23 SIPP 2014 Panel Re-identification Aref Dajani, Steve Clark, Phyllis (Re-id) Study Findings and Singer -- Census Bureau Recommendations
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Each team approached its topic by conducting literature reviews to identify the most up-to-date research on it, considering nuances, and conducting assessments of the published research based on analysis of SIPP data. Teams met in separate, closed, remote meetings three times, each meeting followed by a closed panel meeting to review and summarize their progress.
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When operating within a user agreement, such as through a Federal Statistical Research Data Center, there are mechanisms in place to prevent the release of confidential information, though those mechanisms could potentially be expanded, such as through the use of artificial intelligence. PREVIOUS COMMITTEE ON NATIONAL STATISTICS STUDIES RELATING TO SIPP The current study is one of several conducted by the National Academies over the past 34 years.
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Office of Management and Budget asked the Committee on National Statistics at the National Academies to perform an independent study of SIPP. In an initial interim report, the committee examined the goals of SIPP, how well the survey was meeting the goals, and the quality and utility of SIPP data products.
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This study was part of a re-engineering of SIPP started in 2006 by the Census Bureau, with the panel focusing on the linking of administrative records and SIPP data (National Research Council, 2009)
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In this regard, the bureau should develop partial synthesis techniques for SIPP public-use microdata files that, based on evaluation results, are found to preserve the research utility of the information. For SIPP data that cannot be publicly released, the Census Bureau should give high priority to developing a secure remote access system that does not require visiting a Research Data Center to use the informa tion.
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6) • Recommendation 9-1: The Census Bureau should release SIPP data within 1 year of the end of data collection.
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