Truata addresses global data privacy concerns

Truata has launched Truata Calibrate - a new risk assessment solution that enables companies to consistently identify and score privacy risks in their datasets, within their own data environments.

Truata Calibrate provides organisations with a greater understanding of their data - where the privacy risks lie and how they can be addressed. This means privacy teams have a standardised method to quantify risk, analysts can fine-tune their datasets to maximise utility and data owners can be confident they are making decisions that serve their business objectives, while safeguarding customer privacy.

Using proprietary patent pending technology, Truata Calibrate pinpoints the attributes within a dataset that would identify an individual, either by themselves or in combination with other data. It then recommends which of those attributes should be transformed, so that the ability to identify an individual is reduced or eliminated. The degree to which the data needs to be de-personalised to make it safe to use and share is controlled by the organisation and will always be context dependent.

Dr. Maurice Coyle, Chief Data Scientist at Truata, said: “We all know how valuable insights from consumer data are in today’s world, especially with our ever-growing digital footprint. But data-driven organisations are lacking clarity, and therefore confidence, regarding what personal data they can use safely, and for what purpose. This restricts the opportunities for innovation and hampers the ability to better serve their customers. 

 “The result is that many companies use a broad-brush approach to meeting compliancy requirements, but by doing so they reduce the value in their data. The detailed risk scoring that Truata Calibrate produces means an organisation can take very targeted de-identification actions to both reduce risk and minimise the impact on analytical value.”

Aoife Sexton Chief Privacy Officer and Chief of Product Innovation at Truata commented: “We’ve created Truata Calibrate, so businesses can have peace of mind that they can utilise and share data to its full potential while remaining compliant with data protection regulations. Importantly, organisations can demonstrate in a meaningful way, how they are acting responsibly and ethically when it comes to their consumers’ data. In the rush to be more data driven, it should not be forgotten that personal data is about real people and the lives they live.”

The general availability release for Truata Calibrate is scheduled for December 2020. In addition to Truata Calibrate, the company is set to launch Truata Transform in Q1 2021. This software product will complement Truata Calibrate by taking the high-risk data that has been identified, and seamlessly transforming it into a privacy-enhanced dataset, within a company’s own data environment. These two solutions form part of a suite of products that Truata will roll out across 2021.