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It's worth nothing that the Datastore in question has undergone a Data Protection Impact assessment[1] which states that this information Palantir has access to

It's worth nothing that the Datastore in question has undergone a Data Protection Impact assessment[1] which states that this information Palantir has access to will be in anonymised form and even aggregated. In fact its non-anonymised data never hits the "Datastore" (Palantir Foundry) or leaves NHS Systems. Morally sketchy extension to the contract? Yes. Illegal? No. [1] https://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/202004-DPIA-NHS-COVID19-data-store-v1.4.pdf https://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/202004... Edit: Corrected Palantir will have access to data, not be given it.

LatteLazy 6y ago
It's not really possible anonymise health data. If you know someone's DoB, Sex and ZipCode you can identify something like 87% of Americans from publicly available sources [0]. This is why sharing even redacted datasets isn't generally done. [0] https://www.wired.com/2007/12/why-anonymous-data-sometimes-isnt/ https://www.wired.com/2007/12/why-anonymous-data-sometimes-i... Edited to correct the star (89->87, also Americans not Brits, I thought it was Brits)
- turnerc 6y ago
  It's certainly possible to do, whether or not the controls are in place to prevent re-identification is a different matter... The document I linked says they do have these controls in place but having done my fair slog in the NHS I'm doubtful.
  - LatteLazy 6y ago
    The best I can see from there pdf is that the data will be "pseudonymised". Maybe I'm misreading it... I'll be impressed if there is some clever mathematical process to truly anonymise it!
    - MaxBarraclough 6y ago
      I'm reminded of Schneier's Law: Any person can invent a security system so clever that he or she can't imagine a way of breaking it. Does something similar apply here? Can it be formally proven that there's no way to de-anonymise the data?
- Zenst 6y ago
  It is possible - depends how granular the data is. For example - drug manufacturers want to know demand so they can plan ahead. But in the UK, doctors, NHS, DOH etc don't share that data of usage as would be granular enough to be possibly identifiable - so how do they get the data. Well, chemists/hospitals are supplied by a few companies(Think Amazon for drugs/medical supplies) - they can from ordering terminals from those customers, give hourly totals level of demand to the manufacturers if they will pay for it. See, the distributors are and have been in a position for decades to cash in upon selling such data at a level in which you will not identify any single individual ever. Also was secure back then on many levels for transfer. Oh and those rare drugs that only few people have - that and other area's of data is never sold. What data is sold is you everyday drugs, as manufacturing really does have to plan ahead more with some drugs than others, more so when the shelf life various as does storage and then some customers will only take drugs with at least X time left until expiry. So planning supply and demand really does get very complicated, very quickly. Hence knowing as real-time I've worked upon such a system at a large EU based company 20 odd years ago, also worked at the UK DOH during the transition days from Conservative to Labour and ironical just the other day found the old Tony Blair letter introducing the new future ahead to DOH staff. Now in this case they say aggregated data, which can be done in a way that if you can pick out an individual, you would of already mastered unscrambling eggs.
  - DanBC 6y ago
    How does OpenPrescribing fit here? https://openprescribing.net/ https://openprescribing.net/ Here's the practice-level prescribing data for GPs in England: https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/areas-of-interest/prescribing/practice-level-prescribing-in-england-a-summary https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/areas-of-interes... Here's all the GP prescribing for (god-awful) co-proxamol: https://openprescribing.net/chemical/0407010Q0/ https://openprescribing.net/chemical/0407010Q0/ Here's co-proxamol prescribing by CCG[1]: https://openprescribing.net/analyse/#org=CCG&numIds=0407010Q0&denomIds=4.7.1&selectedTab=summary https://openprescribing.net/analyse/#org=CCG&numIds=0407010Q... Here's co-proxamol prescribing by NHS Gloucestershire CCG: https://openprescribing.net/ccg/11M/lpcoprox/ https://openprescribing.net/ccg/11M/lpcoprox/ Here's co-proxamol for one GP practice (Royal Well Surgery) within Gloucestershire: https://openprescribing.net/measure/coproxamol/practice/L84049/ https://openprescribing.net/measure/coproxamol/practice/L840...
deleted 6y ago
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LatteLazy 6y ago

It's not really possible anonymise health data. If you know someone's DoB, Sex and ZipCode you can identify something like 87% of Americans from publicly available sources [0]. This is why sharing even redacted datasets isn't generally done. [0] https://www.wired.com/2007/12/why-anonymous-data-sometimes-isnt/ https://www.wired.com/2007/12/why-anonymous-data-sometimes-i... Edited to correct the star (89->87, also Americans not Brits, I thought it was Brits)

turnerc 6y ago
It's certainly possible to do, whether or not the controls are in place to prevent re-identification is a different matter... The document I linked says they do have these controls in place but having done my fair slog in the NHS I'm doubtful.
- LatteLazy 6y ago
  The best I can see from there pdf is that the data will be "pseudonymised". Maybe I'm misreading it... I'll be impressed if there is some clever mathematical process to truly anonymise it!
  - MaxBarraclough 6y ago
    I'm reminded of Schneier's Law: Any person can invent a security system so clever that he or she can't imagine a way of breaking it. Does something similar apply here? Can it be formally proven that there's no way to de-anonymise the data?
Zenst 6y ago
It is possible - depends how granular the data is. For example - drug manufacturers want to know demand so they can plan ahead. But in the UK, doctors, NHS, DOH etc don't share that data of usage as would be granular enough to be possibly identifiable - so how do they get the data. Well, chemists/hospitals are supplied by a few companies(Think Amazon for drugs/medical supplies) - they can from ordering terminals from those customers, give hourly totals level of demand to the manufacturers if they will pay for it. See, the distributors are and have been in a position for decades to cash in upon selling such data at a level in which you will not identify any single individual ever. Also was secure back then on many levels for transfer. Oh and those rare drugs that only few people have - that and other area's of data is never sold. What data is sold is you everyday drugs, as manufacturing really does have to plan ahead more with some drugs than others, more so when the shelf life various as does storage and then some customers will only take drugs with at least X time left until expiry. So planning supply and demand really does get very complicated, very quickly. Hence knowing as real-time I've worked upon such a system at a large EU based company 20 odd years ago, also worked at the UK DOH during the transition days from Conservative to Labour and ironical just the other day found the old Tony Blair letter introducing the new future ahead to DOH staff. Now in this case they say aggregated data, which can be done in a way that if you can pick out an individual, you would of already mastered unscrambling eggs.
- DanBC 6y ago
  How does OpenPrescribing fit here? https://openprescribing.net/ https://openprescribing.net/ Here's the practice-level prescribing data for GPs in England: https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/areas-of-interest/prescribing/practice-level-prescribing-in-england-a-summary https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/areas-of-interes... Here's all the GP prescribing for (god-awful) co-proxamol: https://openprescribing.net/chemical/0407010Q0/ https://openprescribing.net/chemical/0407010Q0/ Here's co-proxamol prescribing by CCG[1]: https://openprescribing.net/analyse/#org=CCG&numIds=0407010Q0&denomIds=4.7.1&selectedTab=summary https://openprescribing.net/analyse/#org=CCG&numIds=0407010Q... Here's co-proxamol prescribing by NHS Gloucestershire CCG: https://openprescribing.net/ccg/11M/lpcoprox/ https://openprescribing.net/ccg/11M/lpcoprox/ Here's co-proxamol for one GP practice (Royal Well Surgery) within Gloucestershire: https://openprescribing.net/measure/coproxamol/practice/L84049/ https://openprescribing.net/measure/coproxamol/practice/L840...

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]