What is PII and which of the following are examples?

• A. PII stands for Publicly Identifiable Information; examples include full name and government ID number.
• B. PII stands for Personally Internal Information; examples include internal emails.
• C. PII stands for Personally Identifiable Information; examples include full name and government ID number.
• D. PII stands for Protected Information; examples include passwords.

Answer: (C)

PII stands for Personally Identifiable Information, data that can identify a specific person either on its own or when combined with other information. A classic example is a person’s full name along with a government-issued identifier like a government ID number. These items can directly link data to an individual, which is why they’re treated as sensitive.

The other options miss the standard term or the typical examples: calling it Publicly Identifiable Information suggests something that’s already public, which isn’t the recognized meaning; using Personally Internal Information with internal emails uses a nonstandard term and isn’t the accepted definition; and Protected Information isn’t the abbreviation for PII, and passwords are security credentials rather than identifiers of a person, so they don’t illustrate PII by themselves.