Synthetic Data Disclosure Risk Assessment: A Literature Review
Articles and reports: 11-522-X202500100016Description: The adoption of synthetic data generation as a confidentiality measure is increasing in statistical agencies worldwide, including at Statistics Canada. This approach provides an alternative to the traditional dissemination of anonymized public microdata files, offering both privacy protection and data utility. However, the creation of synthetic data presents challenges in assessing and mitigating disclosure risks. This paper reviews the different types of disclosure risks, that being attribute, membership and identity disclosure, and presents some of the associated methods for measuring risk. The paper presents prominent risk assessment metrics and discusses practical methods for disclosure control in data synthesis. Methods for assessing disclosure risks usually produce a metric that can be used to gauge the risk, but there is little consensus on threshold values for these metrics. It is also important to focus on importance of balancing utility and confidentiality, which needs further discussion in context of these methods. The paper concludes by offering insights and recommendations about managing disclosure risk while creating synthetic data as well as providing some ideas on future directions for research and practical implications for managing disclosure risks in synthetic data. Issue Number: 2025001Author(s): Yu, Zhe SiMain Product:Statistics Canada International Symposium Series: Proceedings
