Information Theory and Anonymity
Claudia Díaz, Joris Claessens, Stefaan Seys, Bart Preneel · 2002
Abstract. There is an increasing concern about the protection of anonymity and privacy in electronic services. Many web sites store and process personal data of users in order to provide a better service. Users prefer not to give away personal information if this can be avoided. This paper introduces a model, based on Shannon’s definition of entropy, with which the degree of anonymity of a set of users grouped in several subsets can be quantified in an objective way. This model is applied to a practical case in which users are associated to profiles, and the degree of anonymity achieved by those users, is measured under different conditions. 1