Patent ID: 9576152
Date: 2017-02-21
CPC Classifications: G06F,G06N,H04L

Claim:
1. A computer-implemented method of protecting data comprising: determining a desired duplication rate for a data set based on a level of desired anonymity for the data in the data set, wherein at least one data record in the data set includes fewer attributes than a corresponding original record and the desired duplication rate is (1−1/K), where K is an anonymity parameter; generating a self-score threshold for data records within the data set based on the desired duplication rate and Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) curves including a threshold determined from a logarithm of N/(10+9K), where N is the number of data records within the data, wherein a matching function compares a first data record with a second data record to compute a matching score which is a logarithm of a ratio of a first value to a second value, wherein the first value represents a likelihood that the first data record and the second data record both relate to a same entity, and the second value represents a likelihood that the first data record and the second data record relate to different entities; producing a data record self-score for each data record within the data set based on a comparison of attributes for that data record to attributes of the corresponding original data record, wherein the data record self-score for a data record is the result of applying the matching function to compare the data record to the corresponding original data record; comparing the data record self-scores to the self-score threshold; and controlling access to the data records of the data set based on the data record self-scores satisfying the self-score threshold.