New directions in anonymization: Permutation paradigm, verifiability by subjects and intruders, transparency to users.

There are currently two approaches to anonymization: “utility first” (use an anonymization method with suitable utility features, then empirically evaluate the disclosure risk and, if necessary, reduce the risk by possibly sacrificing some utility) or “privacy first” (enforce a target privacy level via a privacy model, e.g., k-anonymity or ε-differential privacy, without regard to utility). To get formal privacy guarantees, the second approach must be followed, but then data releases with no utility guarantees are obtained. Also, in general it is unclear how verifiable is anonymization by the data subject (how safely released is the record she has contributed?), what type of intruder is being considered (what does he know and want?) and how transparent is anonymization towards the data user (what is the user told about methods and parameters used?).