1. A method for use within secure multi-party computation, comprising: storing, by one or more data processors, a plurality of operation preferences including allowed database operations and a cryptographic preference, which are both associated with a data set, each cryptographic preference specifying two or more encryption protocols; storing, by the one or more data processors, the data set on an element by element basis, according to the cryptographic preference; analyzing, by the one or more data processors, a query associated with at least the data set; determining, by the one or more data processors, that processing the query involves performing an allowable operation on the data set based on the operation preference; determining, by the one or more data processors, elements of the data set required to perform the allowable operation on the data set; selecting, by the one or more data processors, an encryption protocol specified by the cryptographic preference for each respective element of the data set; and using, by the one or more data processors, the at least one of the two or more encryption protocols to perform the allowable operation on the data set, wherein merchant data owners jointly process their pooled data to perform transactional data analysis while keeping their respective data private from one another, with a summarized version of a transactional data analysis provided to one of the merchant data owners.