Census Data Change for Privacy Rattles Researchers

“A plan to protect the confidentiality of Americans’ responses to the 2020 census by injecting small, calculated distortions into the results is raising concerns that it will erode their usability for research and distribution of state and federal funds,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

“The Census Bureau is due to release the first major results of the decennial count in mid-August… The bureau will adjust most of those statistics to prevent someone from recombining them in a way that would disclose information about an individual respondent. Testing by the bureau shows that improvements in data science, computing power and commercial databases make that feasible.”