What is the disclosure avoidance order?
On June 4, 2026 the Department of Commerce issued a new order “Disclosure Avoidance for Statistical Products” (DAO 216-26) that limits the types of privacy protection methods that the Census Bureau and Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) can use for their data products.
This order upends processes developed over decades to foster transparency and public trust and creates a scenario in which there will either be less privacy for our personal information, or less usable public data, or both.
Notably, the DAO has resulted in an indefinite delay in American Community Survey, is likely to result in changes to the availability of County Business Patterns data, and is serving as a justification to remove some demographic information from the decennial census.
Learn how to read a SORN, read the handbook (updated 2026-08-18):