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Legal/Confidentiality


This area addresses the Census Bureau's authority to gather these data and the protections guaranteed to your company. See Census Bureau's Data Protection and Privacy Policy for additional detailed information.

Confidentiality of Reported Data

The U.S. Census Bureau is required by Title 13 United States Code, Section 9, to keep your information confidential and can use your responses only to produce statistics. The Census Bureau is not permitted to publicly release your responses in a way that could identify your business, organization, or institution. Per the Federal Cybersecurity Enhancement Act of 2015, your data are protected from cybersecurity risks through screening of the systems that transmit your data.

Note: Some surveys compile data from public records (e.g., building permits). Title 13 United States Code authorizes the Census Bureau to conduct these collections, but these data are subject to provisions of Title 13 United States Code, Section 9(b), exempting data that are customarily provided in public records from rules of confidentiality.

Legal Authority to Conduct the Economic Census and Surveys

Title 13, U.S.C., Section 131, directs the Census Bureau to conduct the economic census at 5-year intervals covering years ending in 2 and 7. Title 13, U.S.C., Section 182, authorizes the Census Bureau to conduct monthly, quarterly, and annual surveys to furnish more timely reports on subjects covered by the economic census.

Use of Data Your Company Reported to Other Government Agencies

We make extensive use of administrative information from other government agencies in order to help reduce your reporting burden. These provide basic data - total receipts, total payroll, and total employment - needed to produce statistics for geographic areas and types of businesses. However, we must obtain data from all large companies and a small, scientifically designed sample of smaller ones, in order to provide data on a wide range of subjects covered by the surveys/censuses. Confidentiality of data used from other federal agencies is strictly enforced. Also, please note that these same agencies cannot obtain data for an individual establishment or company from us.

Full Text of Laws Authorizing and Controlling Data Collection by the Census Bureau

Full text of the United States Code.



Source: U.S. Census Bureau | BHS Team |   Last Revised: January 04, 2018 14:14:54