Thanks for posting this interesting article. One very important consideration regarding anonymization and/or de-identification is that masking, or hashing, or encrypting the personally identifiable information (PII) is not generally accepted as sufficient within the biopharmaceutical industries in terms of preventing a downstream data consumer from gaining access to a participant's actual identity.

There are a variety of reasons for this, but, in general, de-identification and anonymization involve applying different rules to different types of data in order to reduce the risk of re-identification. This can include, for example, changing all date values while preserving the relative timings between patient data activities, selectively redacting sensitive information and more comprehensive and complex approaches.

The approach described in the original article is an important step in the process, but the reader should not walk away from the article with the expectation that a participant's privacy is sufficiently protected. The more comprehensive approach is described at www.d-wise.com/blur and may also be described in the author's proposed next article - "Anonymization for Analysts". I look forward to reading it.

Dave