Data De-Identification

Learn how to remove personal information about an individual from a data source.

Overview

If a customer wants to remove personal information about individuals from their data in Visier, such as names or email addresses, you can contact Visier Technical Support to fulfill the request. In Visier, de-identification replaces the original data value with an empty value.

To de-identify data, provide Visier with a CSV file that specifies the data to de-identify.

Example: De-identify employee data

Let's say a customer requests to de-identify some data in Visier and provides the following CSV file:

Source Key Column Columns to modify Values to match
Source_designde83a7ca_e31d_46e7_9a2c_35cccb7aef0e EmployeeID Title,Caption Employee-13
Source_designde83a7ca_e31d_46e7_9a2c_35cccb7aef0e EmployeeID Start_Date  
Source_designde83a7ca_e31d_46e7_9a2c_35cccb7aef0e EmployeeID Current_Status Employee-15,Employee-16
Source_design0dbeccdf_0253_4d52_82c3_20befa9bdeb3 EmployeeID Hire_Type,Cost_Currency_Code Employee-1170184

In this example, the same source appears 3 times, which allows the customer to specify different columns and values to match for different records.

In Source_designde83..., the customer wants to remove:

  • Title and Caption for Employee-13.
  • Start_Date for all employees.
  • Current_Status for Employee-15 and Employee-16.

In Source_design0dbe..., the customer wants to remove:

  • Hire_Type and Cost_Currency_Code for Employee-1170184.

In all rows, EmployeeID is the Key Column, meaning that Visier matches EmployeeID against the Values to match column for de-identification.

CSV configuration file

The CSV file must contain the following header columns:

  • Source: The object name of the source. You can find a source's object name in the global workspace by doing the following:
    1. In the global workspace, navigate to Data > Sources.
    2. Select a source.
    3. Click Basic Information.
    4. To find the object name, look at the Object name field.
  • Key Column: The primary key for the data; for example, EmployeeID.
  • Columns to modify: The columns to de-identify; for example, Start_Date.

    Caution:  

    • Avoid de-identifying values in hierarchies such as Organization ID or Manager ID. The removal of hierarchy values creates unknown values in hierarchies.
    • Avoid de-identifying date columns that are used for important date fields such as EventDate or Record_Period_ID. It's fine to remove date fields like BirthDate.
  • Values to match: The values to match against the Key Column. If blank, all records are selected; for example, Employee-13. In this example, Employee-13's Start_Date data is de-identified.

Tip: The header columns are case-sensitive.

After you send the file to Visier, we run a de-identification job to process the data. Before sending the file to Visier, verify the following about the CSV file:

  • The header exists and is correct. If the CSV doesn't include a header, the de-identification job fails.
  • There are no spaces before or after commas ,. If spaces are present, the de-identification job cannot validate and may lose some de-identification parameters.
  • The Source column in the CSV file corresponds to sources in Visier. Compare the Source column values in the CSV file against the Source object names in Visier.
  • There are no empty lines.

You can use the following template to create a CSV configuration file to de-identify your customer's data.

Note: In the CSV configuration file:

  • Empty square brackets, [], selects all values.
  • The Columns to modify and Values to match columns can select more than one value if separated by a comma; for example, [Title,Caption] or [Employee-15,Employee-16].
Copy 
Source,Key Column,Columns to modify,Values to match[Source_designde83a7ca_e31d_46e7_9a2c_35cccb7aef0e],[EmployeeID],[Title,Caption],[Employee-13]
[Source_designde83a7ca_e31d_46e7_9a2c_35cccb7aef0e],[EmployeeID],[Start_Date],[]
[Source_designde83a7ca_e31d_46e7_9a2c_35cccb7aef0e],[EmployeeID],[Current_Status],[Employee-15,Employee-16]
[Source_design0dbeccdf_0253_4d52_82c3_20befa9bdeb3],[EmployeeID],[Hire_Type,Cost_Currency_Code],[Employee-1170184]