It's a new day for those looking to drive more knowledge from their data. IBM has developed a first-of-its-kind software solution that enables you to analyze proprietary data without jeopardizing privacy. Businesses can compare customer or partner information without revealing sensitive identity information. Healthcare organizations can improve research without breaking HIPAA privacy rules. Airlines and governments can share passenger data and boost security without breaching international privacy codes. It's a new capability that creates new applications and opportunities. It's called IBM Anonymous Resolution.
IBM Anonymous Resolution is one part of a set of related software solutions focused on identity resolution. As part of its DB2 Entity Analytic Solutions, IBM also offers IBM Identity Resolution and IBM Relationship Resolution. All of these products help resolve identity across multiple data sets and also determine the relationship between resolved identities and other entities. In other words, they help you understand 'who is who?' and 'who knows whom?' The core technology for these solutions came from IBM's recent acquisition of SRD, a privately held company in Nevada.
"The seemingly simple questions of 'who is who?' and 'who knows whom?' cut across a wide variety of business problems today," said Janet Perna, General Manager, IBM Information Management Software about the acquisition. "The SRD technology provides solutions to these age-old problems with unparalleled speed and accuracy."
The simple questions of 'who is who?' and 'who knows whom?' cut across a wide variety of business problems today Answering these questions anonymously means organizations can compare data and discover knowledge that was previously 'off limits' because of privacy considerations. The impact is significant as organizations can apply the software to recognize and eliminate fraud, identify new business opportunities from existing information and enhance the capabilities of fighting the war on terror.
Collaborative information sharing raises significant privacy issues. Organizations face legal action, losing the trust of their clients and partners as well as the loss of a trusted reputation in the public eye. Protecting privacy and countering data loss and identity theft are major concerns. According MSNBC News, a Gartner study found that one third of consumers are 'very concerned' about becoming victims of identity theft and nearly half are altering their online activities as a result. This report comes with recent news from major companies regarding data loss incidents that affect millions of consumers. The ability to securely analyze data is increasingly critical, as organizations must do all they can to develop and maintain trustful relationships.
Today's Chief Privacy Officers are trying to move beyond compliance with privacy issues.
At the same time, organizations realize the value of finding out 'who's who?' and 'who knows whom?' and are looking for ways to discover new attributes of their data and create opportunities. Imagine a business and one of its partners wanting to create a joint marketing campaign, but cannot because they can't compare customer and prospect lists in fear of breaking privacy rules. Or two companies that are merging might wish to compare data to ensure the right customers get the right information about the merger. It would be nice to know, but privacy looms.
Today's leading companies are looking for a balance between managing the risk (defense) of privacy and security issues and the opportunity (offense) of gaining insight into their information. Today's Chief Privacy Officers or CPOs are trying to move beyond compliance with privacy issues and create efficiency and opportunity from their protected information. IBM can help on defense with solutions from its Tivoli portfolio. It includes software for access management, federated identity management, security compliance management and storage and optimization solutions. On offense, IBM provides a complete portfolio of business intelligence solutions that is now strengthened by the capabilities of IBM Anonymous Resolution.
So how does the data remain anonymous? For years, cryptologists have used a technique called one-way hashing to hide data by transforming pieces of information into fixed strings of alphanumeric characters. For example, the text 'John Smith' would be encrypted to a hashed value of 'h7393hdjd83j39shs63hj36,' so you could share the fact that John Smith appears in different data sets, but his personally identifiable information is hidden. One-way hashing seems like a great way for two organizations to compare data and discover knowledge without risking privacy problems. But then it gets complicated.
In order for one-way hashing to work, the two (or more) data sets need to be free of irregularities and inconsistencies. Problems that are pervasive in differing sets of data. For example, John Smith might be John H Smith in another database. These inconsistencies corrupt the hash values and so degrade any insight detected through one-way hashing.
IBM Anonymous Resolution correlates hashed data accurately despite inconsistencies. IBM Anonymous Resolution's breakthrough is to correlate hashed data accurately despite inconsistencies. The software leverages IBM Relationship Resolution context-accumulating (patent-pending) and pre-processing techniques before the one-way hash is applied. As a result, Anonymous Resolution achieves a sort of fuzzy matching capability. It can recognize ambiguities, misspellings or partial records and resolve identities and achieve greater accuracy.
The emergence of technology such as IBM Anonymous Resolution is changing the game when it comes to privacy and security. After all, you can't really change the rules. It enables today's organizations to play offense and defense with their sensitive data. This is critical in an era where information is increasingly integrated and vulnerable and at the same time you have to leverage more value from your information to stay competitive.
It's difficult to imagine the many uses for IBM Anonymous Resolution, but it clearly should have impact in both business and government organizations. According to Information Week, Dana Gardner from Yankee Group Research said the software is "new and unique for enterprise use."
She also added that "there's potentially a large demand for this, because as more and more digital information is used and distributed, there's a need for a certain level of privacy, while allowing for a maximum amount of business intelligence." IBM Anonymous Resolution should have a strong appeal with its ability to outsmart privacy constraints and help you get more from your information assets.
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