Data Privacy
The Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation (OPRE)/Office of the Chief Data Officer’s (OCDO) Data Privacy Policy Center (DPPC) Team provides essential guidance, technical assistance, and oversight on data privacy, ethics, sharing, and confidentiality. They support ACF programs in navigating complex policy landscapes to enhance coordination, promote responsible information sharing, and identify statutory, regulatory, or policy opportunities and constraints.
Data Privacy Policy Center
The upcoming Data Privacy Policy Center (DPPC) will serve as a centralized resource hub, offering comprehensive services to support responsible data privacy practices across ACF programs. Its mission is to safeguard the privacy of children, families, and communities by promoting ethical, secure data use that improves outcomes. The DPPC will foster integrity and trust in ACF’s operations by grounding efforts in strong privacy principles—ensuring data is used thoughtfully to inform decisions, connect stakeholders, and ethically serve communities more effectively.
Key areas of OPRE/OCDO/DPPC’s work include:
- Interpreting and analyzing laws, reports, and policies related to data sharing and privacy to understand their impact on ACF programs.
- Designing and implementing projects that explore legal, policy, and operational issues associated with data use and sharing.
- Collaborating closely with ACF-Tech, the Office of the General Counsel (OGC), and other key partners to assess privacy risks, recommend solutions, and ensure compliance with federal privacy laws.
- Developing and managing policies and procedures to uphold robust privacy protections across all ACF activities.
- Providing expert guidance throughout the entire data lifecycle—from design and collection through sharing, storage, and disposal—to help safeguard confidentiality and privacy.
Additionally, OPRE/OCDO/DPPC develop comprehensive and robust technical assistance and training resources to empower organizations to share data responsibly, especially data containing personally identifiable information (PII). These resources highlight exemplary practices from diverse organizations that collect and use data to improve services for children and families while thoughtfully addressing privacy concerns.
Featured Resources
Confidentiality Toolkit
November 4, 2021
CCOULD Lessons Learned
May 2, 2023
CCOULD Lessons Learned
May 2, 2023
Examining Child Maltreatment Reports Using Linked County-Level Data
January 20, 2022
Using Hospital Data to Predict Child Maltreatment Risk
January 20, 2022
Methods to Estimate the Community Incidence of Child Maltreatment
January 20, 2022
Methods to Estimate the Community Incidence of Child Maltreatment
January 20, 2022
Findings from the Transitional Living Program Youth Outcomes Study
September 30, 2021
Working with Administrative Data in Early Childhood and Related Fields
February 12, 2021
Projects on this Topic
These are ACF briefs addressing administrative data sharing among particular systems.
Discover a project that seeks to fund the linking of one or more administrative data sets to an existing employment program evaluation and the analysis of those data to track the long-term effects of policy or program interventions.
Learn about a project developing privacy guidance on how organizations can securely share data to enhance services that promote the well-being of children and families.
Linking administrative data sets to program evaluation records is a promising and potentially low-cost means of tracking long-term impacts of social interventions. For the purposes of this project, long-term is defined as greater than five years.
Explore how innovative administrative data linkages can improve understanding of child maltreatment incidence and related risk and protective factors. The Child Maltreatment Incidence (CMI) Data Linkages project identified five sites using linked administrative data to examine child maltreatment incidence and related risk and protective factors, while enhancing their existing linked administrative data through innovative methods.
This project will develop products intended to expand the use of administrative data in analyzing long-term outcomes of federal social program interventions.
The State Child Welfare Data Linkages Descriptive Study aimed to provide novel information regarding connected (linked or integrated) state data that may be leveraged to improve the ongoing and accurate surveillance of child maltreatment incidence and related risk.
The study examined the extent to which child welfare agencies in 50 states, Puerto Rico, and Washington, DC, connected administrative data on child maltreatment to other data sources and aimed to learn more about states’ practices related to sharing and connecting data.
Explore OPRE's research projects for reports, tips and more information on the use of data from TANF and related human services program.