Patent ID: 7305378

Claim:
A method of determining at least one large itemset in a privacy-preserving manner in a distributed computing environment including a plurality of entities, comprising the steps of: a first entity of the plurality of entities exchanging summary information with a second entity of the plurality of entities via a privacy-preserving data sharing protocol such that the privacy of the summary information is preserved, the summary information associated with an entity relating to transactional data stored at the entity; and the first entity determining at least one large itemset based on at least the summary information obtained from the second entity via the privacy-preserving data sharing protocol; wherein the summary information exchanging step further comprises; the first entity transmitting a first random number to the second entity; the first entity receiving from the second entity a first result, the first result representing a summation of the first random number and a second random number associated with the second entity; the first entity transmitting a second result to the second entity, the second result representing a summation of the first result and summary information relating to data stored at the first entity; the first entity receiving a third result from the second entity, the third result representing a summation of the second result and summary information relating to data stored at the second entity; the first entity transmitting a fourth result to the second entity, the fourth result representing a subtraction of the first random number from the third result; and the first entity receiving a fifth result from the second entity, the fifth result representing a subtraction of the second random number from the fourth result.