Introduction
The Institute for Research on Poverty (IRP) receives and analyzes sensitive and restricted data about individuals as part of its mission to understand the causes and consequences of poverty and to gauge the efficacy of policies designed to combat poverty. IRP is committed to safeguarding the confidentiality of individuals and ensuring that no data are released to individuals or organizations not entitled to receive them.
This training describes the precautions, policies, and procedures in place at IRP to maintain the strictest levels of confidentiality.
People at IRP whose research project authorizes them to access sensitive or restricted data are required to adhere to and uphold all of these policies. Principal Investigators (PIs) who manage people with access to this data are responsible for ensuring compliance with all of these policies.
Both those who access sensitive and restricted data and PIs whose projects use these data must complete this training.
Data access is limited by project. Individual projects must obtain the support and/or approval of the State agency (or agencies) that owns and provides the data.
IRP Data Security Training
Access levels to confidential research data at IRP
Personnel at IRP whose work may authorize them access to IRP sensitive and restricted data belong to one of the following groups:
Data Scientists
IRP Data Scientists have the highest level of access to sensitive and restricted data at IRP; they provide research data (like the Wisconsin Administrative Data Core, WADC) to researchers for which the most sensitive personal identifiers have been removed or masked
Researchers
Research teams analyze the confidential data and produce results in which the data are aggregated; they generally do not require knowledge of individual identifiers.
CRD Data Collectors
Data Collectors collect and update case information from public records maintained at county courthouses to create the new cohorts of the Court Record Data Collection at IRP.
SSCC maintains the computing resources for IRP
IRP is a member of the Social Science Computing Cooperative (SSCC), which maintains the servers and computer networks used by University departments and Institutes located in the William Sewell Social Science Building.
All confidential data received by IRP is stored on an SSCC-operated secure server, SILO.
Although IRP takes great care to ensure that electronic security is current and effective, IRP and the Social Science Computing Cooperative (SSCC) understand that it is ultimately up to the user to maintain data confidentiality.
Continue to SECTION I of the training