With the increasing collection and use of personal data, organisations may find themselves at more risk of encountering data breaches and anonymising data is one way to reduce that risk. Anonymised personal data can be used to generate insights for innovation while providing protection to individuals.

Organisations can perform basic anonymisation of their datasets through a simple 5-step process:

Guide to Basic Anonymisation

Learn techniques in anonymising data and how to appropriately perform de-identification and anonymisation of various datasets with the Guide to Basic Anonymisation [1].

It helps organisations to share data with other organisations or entities, where additional administrative and technical controls may be imposed to reduce the risk of unauthorised disclosure of personal data.

Access the guide here.

[1] This guide replaces the Guide to Basic Data Anonymisation Techniques as of 31 March 2022.

Data Anonymisation Tool

Use this free data anonymisation tool to transform simple datasets by applying anonymisation techniques. An infographic that provides guidance on how to use the tool is also included. 

Download the file here.
(The file has been encrypted to prevent Anti-virus software from quarantining the Excel spreadsheet and can be extracted using 7-Zip (or a similar software) with the password "Anonymise123!").

System Requirements:

• The Data Anonymisation tool was developed and tested using Excel 2010, 2016 and 2019 on Microsoft Windows Operating System (OS). The tool may not work properly on other versions of Excel on Windows.
• Ensure that the regional format on your device is set to "English (Singapore)" by accessing the "Region" settings within Windows, or searching "Region" using the Windows search bar.

To check that the tool that you have downloaded is authentic and has not been tampered with, take the following steps:

1. Open the Windows command prompt by entering "cmd" in the Windows search bar found at the bottom-left of your screen.
2. Find the folder containing the downloaded tool. (E.g., type "cd C:\Users\<your_user_name>\Downloads" if the tool was downloaded to your Downloads folder)
3. Run the certutil command by typing "certutil -hashfile pdpc-anon-tool-2022.zip sha256".
4. Check that the hash output is cee3f316868cc9674461bf03bb5c9b26f99a02cb739392c70def3412c93525c0 to verify the file's authenticity.