His primary research is on technology ensuring privacy in the analysis and management of data. He also works on challenges posed by novel uses of data mining technology, including data mining of text and data mining techniques applied to interoperation of heterogeneous information sources. He earned his Bachelor's and Master's degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1986, and his Ph.D. from Princeton University in 1991. Prior to joining Purdue, Dr. Clifton was a principal scientist in the Information Technology Division at the MITRE Corporation. Before joining MITRE in 1995, he was an assistant professor of computer science at Northwestern University.