Under the new policy, as of October 1, 2017, NIH funded researchers will no longer have to request a Certificate of Confidentiality (CoC), nor will they receive an actual certificate. The CoC will be issued automatically to NIH-funded grants, cooperative agreements, contracts and intramural research projects research funded wholly or in part by the NIH that collects or uses identifiable, sensitive information. Compliance with the requirements of the law will become a term and condition of award. All research that was commenced or ongoing on or after December 13, 2016 and is within the scope of this policy is issued a Certificate through this policy.
This policy applies to all biomedical, behavioral, clinical, or other research funded wholly or in part by the NIH, whether supported through grants, cooperative agreements, contracts, other transaction awards, or conducted by the NIH Intramural Research Program, that collects or uses identifiable, sensitive information. For the purposes of this Policy, consistent with subsection 301(d) of the Public Health Service Act (42 U.S.C 241), the term “identifiable, sensitive information” means information about an individual that is gathered or used during the course of biomedical, behavioral, clinical, or other research, where the following may occur:
- An individual is identified; or
- For which there is at least a very small risk, that some combination of the information, a request for the information, and other available data sources could be used to deduce the identity of an individual.
This Policy also acknowledges that the NIH will continue to consider request for Certificates for non-federally funded research in which identifiable, sensitive information is collected or used.
