# Can I find particular individuals in the IPUMS data?

**URL:** <https://forum.ipums.org/t/can-i-find-particular-individuals-in-the-ipums-data/148>\
**Category:** General\
**Created:** [January 19, 2013, 7:12am UTC](https://forum.ipums.org/t/can-i-find-particular-individuals-in-the-ipums-data/148 "2013-01-19T07:12:00Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![IPUMS](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/forum.ipums.org/ipums/32/41_2.png) [@IPUMS](https://forum.ipums.org/u/IPUMS)\
**Post date:** [January 19, 2013, 7:12am UTC](https://forum.ipums.org/t/can-i-find-particular-individuals-in-the-ipums-data/148/1 "2013-01-19T07:12:00Z")

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Can I find particular individuals in the IPUMS data?

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![IPUMS](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/forum.ipums.org/ipums/32/41_2.png) [@IPUMS](https://forum.ipums.org/u/IPUMS)\
**Post date:** [January 19, 2013, 11:17pm UTC](https://forum.ipums.org/t/can-i-find-particular-individuals-in-the-ipums-data/148/2 "2013-01-19T23:17:00Z")

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No. A variety of steps have been taken to ensure the confidentiality of the data. Most fundamentally, the modern samples do not contain names or addresses. In general, the data are only samples so there is no guarantee any given individual will be in the dataset. In the historical full count data sets names are not identified.