Re: st: RE: RE: Encryption of data

[David Bell <dcbell@iupui.edu>]

Dear Hendri,

We sociologists (and others) make a distinction between anonymity and  
confidentiality.  To make a dataset anonymous, it would seem you need  
to remove the variable that has the names.

Concealing the names is an attempt to make the data confidential so  
that only those with a key will be able to identify a particular  
case.  If you are trying to share data with someone else (and  
preserve confidentiality), why not put the names variable in a  
separate file, encrypt the file, and send it along with the original  
(unencrypted) data without names.

If the receiver needs to recover the names, they can decrypt and - 
merge-.
====================================
David C. Bell
Professor of Sociology
Indiana University Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI)
(317) 278-1336
====================================




On Jun 13, 2007, at 9:16 AM, Hendri Adriaens wrote:


> Hi Nick,
>
> > 1. The question is very general. Do you, for example,
> > want to encrypt some or all variables or whole datasets?
> I want to encrypt only a single variable, to anonimize data.
>
> > 2. On the whole, this kind of question does not seem to arise often
> > in Stata circles. If I ever needed to do it, I would think about
> > doing it in Mata, or of doing it outside Stata.
> I thought of that too, but it's a bit cumbersome and I don't know  
> right now
> which software does implement it. Do you have an idea in case Stata  
> can't do
> it?
>
> Thank you, best,
> -Hendri.
>
>
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