Defining a Threshold Value for Maximum Spatial Information Loss of Masked Geo-Data
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Doctoral College GIscience, Department of Geoinformatics-Z_GIS, University of Salzburg, Schillerstraße 30, 5020 Salzburg, Austria
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Department of Geography and Anthropology, Louisiana State University, E-104 Howe-Russell-Kniffen Geoscience Complex, Baton Rouge, LA 70803, USA
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Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Academic Editor: Wolfgang Kainz
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2015, 4(2), 572-590; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi4020572
Received: 16 February 2015
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Revised: 3 April 2015
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Accepted: 7 April 2015
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Published: 13 April 2015
Geographical masks are a group of location protection methods for the dissemination and publication of confidential and sensitive information, such as health- and crime-related geo-referenced data. The use of such masks ensures that privacy is protected for the individuals involved in the datasets. Nevertheless, the protection process introduces spatial error to the masked dataset. This study quantifies the spatial error of masked datasets using two approaches. First, a perceptual survey was employed where participants ranked the similarity of a diverse sample of masked and original maps. Second, a spatial statistical analysis was performed that provided quantitative results for the same pairs of maps. Spatial statistical similarity is calculated with three divergence indices that employ different spatial clustering methods. All indices are significantly correlated with the perceptual similarity. Finally, the results of the spatial analysis are used as the explanatory variable to estimate the perceptual similarity. Three prediction models are created that indicate upper boundaries for the spatial statistical results upon which the masked data are perceived differently from the original data. The results of the study aim to help potential “maskers” to quantify and evaluate the error of confidential masked visualizations.
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MDPI and ACS Style
Kounadi, O.; Leitner, M. Defining a Threshold Value for Maximum Spatial Information Loss of Masked Geo-Data. ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2015, 4, 572-590. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi4020572
AMA Style
Kounadi O, Leitner M. Defining a Threshold Value for Maximum Spatial Information Loss of Masked Geo-Data. ISPRS International Journal of Geo-Information. 2015; 4(2):572-590. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi4020572
Chicago/Turabian StyleKounadi, Ourania, and Michael Leitner. 2015. "Defining a Threshold Value for Maximum Spatial Information Loss of Masked Geo-Data" ISPRS International Journal of Geo-Information 4, no. 2: 572-590. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi4020572
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