To be sure that Area360 is fully compliant with privacy regulation, we made the decision to reduce the granularity of the address shown on the page. In practice, this usually means removing the exact house number or flat number from the displayed address, while still keeping the full postcode visible. This allows us to preserve useful street, building, town, and postcode context for normal use across the product.
For most users, the practical effect should be limited. You can still understand where a property is located, compare areas, review postcode-level indicators, and use the surrounding location context as before. The main difference is that the most specific part of the displayed address is often removed.
For example, a address such as 17 Sample Road, Exampletown, ZZ99 3WZ may be shown as Sample Road, Exampletown, ZZ99 3WZ or Flat 8, Demo House, 120 Example Street, Sampleford, ZZ99 3WZ may be shown as Demo House, 120 Example Street, Sampleford, ZZ99 3WZ.
We are using a smart approach based on the k-anonymity principle to help ensure the right level of privacy in how address information is presented. The goal is not to remove location context altogether, but to avoid showing a level of precision that is not necessary for the main postcode and area-based use cases in Area360.
At the same time, we still think that the address of a property is not directly PII. However, we need to implement this change to keep the product aligned with privacy and compliance requirements.