Census ponders producing less granular data in next release

By MIKE SCHNEIDER
Associated Press

U.S. Census Bureau officials are pondering whether to produce less granular data in the next release of 2020 census data, dealing with housing and family relationships. That stands to upset researchers who rely on neighborhood-level information for their projects. Census Bureau officials on Friday described the proposal as a tradeoff for producing more accurate information while protecting the privacy of participants in the nation’s head count. This Census Bureau this year introduced a new privacy mechanism into the census data. It injects controlled errors into the numbers at small geographies such as neighborhood blocks so that people can’t be identified.