Census Time
Sunday, April 2nd, 2006 | | No Comments
Say what you will about the government, but when they put their minds to it they can produce some very useful data. The folks at the Census Bureau in particular seem to be good at sharing their data in a way that is useful to people outside their organization. There is a possibility that that comes from their having been in this business for awhile…
The meta-data they provide along with the data is the key. This gives you insight into the process that produced the data, which is always important information to have when analyzing any data set.
Random Data
Friday, March 31st, 2006 | | No Comments
New sources of quasi-random data are interesting. But if one must go to such great lengths to gather that data, its value in a one time encryption process has to be questioned. This is especially true given the fragility of the data source.
Too Much Information
Friday, March 31st, 2006 | | No Comments
When dealing with sensitive information it can’t be stressed how important it is to clean up after you are done with the information. Stories about machines unintentionally keeping too much data serve to remind us of how important it can be to be vigilant about cleaning up and keeping only what you absolutely need.