Almost all Americans can be correctly re-identified from anonymous data, according to research by the Universite catholique de Louvain in Belgium and Imperial College in London. They applied machine learning to 15 demographic characteristics and said more than 80% of individuals could be re-identified. Using just three characteristics, an online tool published by the researchers found that 99% of users could be re-identified. The researchers’ report has been seen as suggesting that common anonymisation tools may not keep pace with privacy laws including GDPR and the Californian Consumer Privacy Act.
Almost all Americans can be correctly re-identified from anonymous data, according to research by the Universite catholique de Louvain in Belgium and Imperial College in London. They applied machine learning to 15 demographic characteristics and said 99% of individuals could be re-identified. Using just three characteristics, an online tool published by the researchers found that more than 80% of users could be re-identified. The researchers’ report has been seen as suggesting that common anonymisation tools may not keep pace with privacy laws including GDPR and the Californian Consumer Privacy Act.