White Papers and Methodology Articles




 Videos of the PARAT tool in use - overview of various functions from novice to expert.
Accessed through the Privacy Analytics Knowledgebase.
 

 The Case for De-Identifying Personal Health Information (EHIL).
A technical report detailing the reasons why, and the situations where, it is important or strongly recommended to de-identify health data.
 

 De-identification: Reduce privacy risks when sharing personally identifiable information (Privacy Analytics).
This whitepaper provides an overview the different ways in which re-identification risk can be measured. All of the approaches described here are used in the Privacy Analytics tools.
 

 Wizard software tool determines odds of breaching patient privacy (CMAJ).
This article explains the rationale for the REB Wizard tool that is made freely available by Privacy Analytics. The full version includes additional functionality, such as data export, and is available as part of the Privacy Analytics tool set.
 

 Risk-Based De-Identification of Health Data (IEEE S&P).
Provides a short description of the general methodology used by Privacy Analytics to evaluate risk.
 

 US Supreme Court Amicus Brief: Sorrell vs. IMS.
An Amicus Brief to the US Supreme Court that our CEO and founder participated in emphasizing that proper de-identification techniques can protect data.
 

 Dispelling the myths surrounding de-identification (Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario).
An important whitepaper, which our CEO and founder co-wrote with with the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario, emphasizing the importance of de-identification and that it provides a critical level of protection when sharing data.
 

 A positive-sum paradigm in action in the health sector (Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario).
This whitepaper, which our CEO and founder co-wrote with with the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario, describes a risk based approach for the de-identification of health information.
 

 Methods for the de-identification of electronic health records for genomic research (Genome Medicine).
A peer-reviewed article providing an overview of practical methods that have been used for the de-identification of health data when disclosed for research purposes, with specific emphasis on genomic research.
 

 A Systematic Review of Re-Identification Attacks on Health Data (PLoS ONE).
A peer-reviewed article summarizing existing evidence on re-identification attacks on health data. The article conclused that there is no convincing evidence suggesting that properly de-identified data can be re-identified.
 

 A Globally Optimal k-Anonymity Method for the De-Identification of Health Data (JAMIA).
A peer-reviewed article that appeared in the Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association describing one of the key algorithms that is used in the Privacy Analytics tools. This algorithm ensures that the globally optimal (i.e., best) solution is found and it has better performance than other currently known methods (i.e., it is much faster). Note: the content is quite technical.
 

 A Method for Evaluating Marketer Re-identification Risk (PAIS).
This is a peer-reviewed article that appeared in 2010 in the Proceedings of the 3rd International Workshop on Privacy and Anonymity in the Information Society describing different re-identification risk metrics that are used in our tools. Note: the content is quite technical.
 



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