DP in the 2020 US Census
Scenario:
- Census bureau releases mean household income by block
- \(N - 1\) households in a block can work together to infer the outcome of household \(N\)
Solution:
Define \(i_{max}\), the hypothetical maximum income
To protect outliers (like Jeff and Bill) clip their values to \(i_{max}\) before computing the mean
Add noise to mean income that’s proportional to \(i_{max} / \epsilon\)