The Census Bureau follows strict privacy protection protocols for respondents and data and, by law, must keep any information about individual respondents confidential.

Title 13 of the U.S. Code authorizes the Census Bureau to conduct surveys and censuses and mandates that any information obtained from private individuals and establishments remain confidential. Section 9 of Title 13 prohibits the Census Bureau from releasing “any publication whereby the data furnished by a particular establishment or individual under this title can be identified.” Section 214 of Title 13, as modified by the Federal Sentencing Reform Act, imposes a fine of up to $250,000 and/or up to 5 years in prison for publication or communication in violation of section 9. The Census Bureau takes steps to protect all data to meet these requirements.

Asking questions about SOGI will help us understand the demographic, social, economic, and housing characteristics of the LGBTQ+ population. These data will be protected like any other data and used in aggregate. Asking questions in a survey or on the census is always a balance. The Census Bureau has a legal obligation to balance the evolving need for information with the additional burden it places on the people who respond. SOGI topics require carefully balancing of how much detail to collect, using terms that resonate with how people identify themselves, and the public’s ability and willingness to respond to the question, especially in the context of the overall survey.

The Census Bureau takes particular care to provide quality data while ensuring confidentiality of respondent data.