A view on statistical disclosure control for microdata

Problems arising from statistical disclosure control, which aims to prevent that information about individual respondents is disclosed by users of data, have come to the fore rapidly in recent years. The main reason for this is the growing demand for detailed data provided by statistical offices caused by the still increasing use of computers. In former days tables with relatively little information were published. Nowadays the users of data demand much more detailed tables and, moreover, microdata to analyze by themselves. Because of this increase in information content statistical disclosure control has become much more difficult. In this paper the authors give their view on the problems which one encounters when trying to protect microdata against disclosure. This view is based on their experience with statistical disclosure control acquired at Statistics Netherlands.