Noise infusion banned from statistical products published by Census Bureau

Post by bombcar » Sat, Jun 13, 2026, 11:05 PM UTC

Forgeties79 wrote: post #328

appreciatorBus wrote: post #244

> Differential privacy makes this trade-off explicit, and thus impossible to ignore. I think he has it backwards here. Techniques like differential privacy hide the fact that a trade-off exists, except for a small cadre of experts who live and breathe this stuff. I don’t know enough to defend this decision, but it strikes me that if there is a real trade-off, not having access to these techniques will force people ot…

> If data about the public is so dangerous that we must disguise the results, then perhaps its data we shouldn’t be collecting in the first place. By this logic no one should ever collect your address for any reason ever. How do we function as a society if we can’t ever give PII in any context? Anonymization/security is critical and makes a lot of critical functions possible. How could you receive your mail in a worl…

Post by bombcar » Sat, Jun 13, 2026, 11:08 PM UTC

layer8 wrote: post #130

iugtmkbdfil834 wrote: post #96

Can anyone explain to me the previous state and why it was desirable? I admittedly do not understand why people are getting riled up. I am not being difficult. I really don't understand the original state and the changed state here.

Read up here for example: https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/decennial/2020/...

Post by throwawa1 » Sat, Jun 13, 2026, 11:10 PM UTC

lkjdsklf wrote: post #341

Dig1t wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Except that has nothing to do with voting which is the claim that was being made

Post by Guvante » Sat, Jun 13, 2026, 11:12 PM UTC

wongarsu wrote: post #329

mschuster91 wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But in NY, house sale records are made public but much to the detriment, many mortgage companies fake a bill for payment. That frankly sounds more like a failure of enforcement, on top of a failure of the construction of the financial system. Here in Germany, it is absolutely not a common thing that mortgages or the banks holding them get sold like a hot potato towards some other sucker, and thus such a letter woul…

Here in Germany, founding a company creates a public record. There are a number of companies who then send all newly formed companies an invoice that looks like a legitimate invoice for expenses related to creating said company, but on closer inspection actually contain a dense paragraph of text that details that this is not an invoice at all, merely an offer you accept by paying. Quite possibly even a subscription I…

Post by EdwardDiego » Sat, Jun 13, 2026, 11:13 PM UTC

nullc wrote: post #368

arjie wrote: post #74

Pretty sad, in my opinion. In my ideal the state should have visibility into the shape of the people present so that we can make good decisions about our combined organization. I think we’re making a mistake we will come to regret by intentionally damaging our data collection infrastructure. I think a large amount of the US’s success is the result of good institutions handling granular data. Policies can be adjusted…

> In my ideal the state should have visibility into the shape of the people present so that we can make good decisions about our combined organization. That ideal became tantamount to enabling genocide when the US government breached the confidentiality of the census in order to prison camp the japanese on the basis of their race. > I understand why people decide to diminish all state capacity It's not even just a qu…