Personally identifiable information

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In information security and privacy, PII is any piece of information which can potentially be used to uniquely identify, contact, or locate a single person. Whilst the acronym PII is commonly used, there is no common or agreed use of the words from which it is created. Common variants are personal identifiable information, personally identifiable information, personal identifying information and personally identifying information. One can even find personal identified information in Google.

Although the concept of PII is ancient, it has become much more important as information technology and the Internet have made it easier to collect PII, leading to a profitable market in collecting and reselling PII. PII can also be exploited by criminals to stalk or steal the identity of a person, or to plan a person's murder or robbery, among other crimes. As a response to these threats, many web site privacy policies specifically address the collection of PII, and lawmakers have enacted a series of legislation to limit the distribution and accessibility of PII.

1 Examples
2 Related laws
3 Forensics
4 Personal safety
5 See also
6 References
7 External links

[edit] Examples

Items which might be considered PII include, but are not limited to, a person's:

Full name (if not common)
National identification number
Telephone number
Street address
E-mail address
IP address (in some cases)
Vehicle registration plate number
Driver's license number
Face, fingerprints, or handwriting
Credit card numbers
Digital identity

Information that is not generally considered personally identifiable, because many people share the same trait, include:

First or last name, if common
Country, state, or city of residence
Age, especially if non-specific
Gender or race
Name of the school they attend or workplace
Grades, salary, or job position
Criminal record

When a person wishes to remain anonymous, descriptions of them will often employ several of the above, such as "a 34-year-old white man who works at Target". Note that information can still be private, in the sense that a person may not wish for it to become publicly known, without being personally identifiable. Moreover, sometimes multiple pieces of information, none of which are PII, may uniquely identify a person when brought together; this is one reason that multiple pieces of evidence are usually presented at criminal trials. For example, there may be only one Inuit person named Steve in the town of Lincoln Park, Michigan.

[edit] Related laws

Below are examples of legal frameworks affecting data privacy in several jurisdictions.

[edit] Canada

Privacy Act (governs the Federal Government agencies)
Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA) of (2001 government entities), (2004 All other entities)

[edit] United States of America

Recently lawmakers have paid a great deal of attention to protecting a person's PII. One of the primary focuses of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), is to protect a patient's PII. The U.S. Senate has recently proposed the Privacy Act of 2005, which attempts to strictly limit the display, purchase, or sale of PII without the person's consent. Similarly, the Anti-phishing Act of 2005 attempts to prevent the acquiring of PII through phishing.

U.S. lawmakers have paid special attention to the social security number because it can be easily used to commit identity theft. The Social Security Number Protection Act of 2005 and Identity Theft Prevention Act of 2005 each seek to limit the distribution of an individual's social security number.

On the other hand, many businesses see this increasing load of legislation as excessive, an unnecessary expense, and a barrier to progress. The increasing complexity of the laws might force companies to consult a lawyer just to engage in simple business practices such as server logging, user registration, and credit checks. Some have predicted such measures may inhibit the industry as a whole, lowering wages and creating a barrier to entry. For this reason, a number of privacy laws stress the "acceptable uses" of PII, such as Massachusetts' Public Records Law and Fair Information Practices Act.

California has privacy written into the state constitution Article 1, Section 1.

Online Privacy Protection Act (OPPA) of 2003

Federal Laws

Privacy Act of 2005
Information Protection and Security Act
Identity Theft Prevention Act of 2005
Online Privacy Protection Act of 2005
Consumer Privacy Protection Act of 2005
Anti-phishing Act of 2005
Social Security Number Protection Act of 2005
Wireless 411 Privacy Act
US 'Safe Harbor' Rules (EU Harmonisation)
Title 18 of the United States Code, section 1028d(7)

[edit] European Union (member states)

Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights
Directive 95/46/EC (Data Protection Directive)
Directive 2002/58/EC (the E-Privacy Directive)
Directive 2006/24/EC Article 5 (The Data Retention Directive)

Further examples can be found on the EU privacy website.

[edit] United Kingdom & Ireland

The UK Data Protection Act 1998
The Irish Data Protection Acts 1998 and 2003
Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights
The UK Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000
Relevant Case Law
Employers' Data Protection Code of Practice
Model Contracts for Data Exports
The necessary content of Privacy Policies
The Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations 2003
The UK Interception of Communications (Lawful Business Practice) Regulations 2000
The UK Anti-Terrorism, Crime & Security Act 2001
The UK Privacy & Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations 2003

[edit] Forensics

In forensics, the tracking down of the identity of a criminal, personally identifiable information is critical in zeroing in on the subject. Criminals will go to great trouble to avoid leaving any PII; they wear masks (faces and hair are PII), gloves (fingerprints are PII), clothing that covers personal marks (tattoos and scars are PII) and avoid writing anything in their own handwriting (handwriting can be PII). Also, more modern 'masks' may be used, such as using a proxy IP address to avoid being tracked online as easily.

[edit] Personal safety

In some professions, it is dangerous for a person's identity to become known, because this information might be exploited violently by their enemies; for example, their enemies might hunt them down or kidnap loved ones to force them to cooperate. For this reason, the United States Department of Defense (DoD) has strict policies controlling release of PII of DoD personnel.^[1] This is also the reason usually given in fiction for superheros and secret agents to disguise their faces and withhold their real names.