Abstract: A de-identification method and an apparatus for performing same on electronic datasets are described. The method and system processes input datasets or databases that contain records relating to individual entities to produce a resulting output dataset that contains as much information as possible while minimizing the risk that any individual in the input dataset could be re-identified from that output dataset. Individual entities may include patients in a hospital or served by an insurance carrier, as well as voters, subscribers, customers, companies, or any other organization of discrete records. Criteria for preventing re-identification can be selected based on intended use of the output data and can be adjusted based on the content of reference databases. The method and system can also be associated with data acquisition equipment, such as a biologic data sampling device, to prevent de-identification of patient or other confidential data acquired by the equipment.