Anonymization Strategies

Clonio applies transformations per column. Columns not listed in .cloning.yaml are copied unchanged.

keep

Copy the value unchanged. This is the implicit default for unlisted columns.

status:
  strategy: keep

fake

Generate realistic synthetic data with FakerPHP.

email:
  strategy: fake
  faker_method: safeEmail
  faker_arguments: []

Examples:

first_name:
  strategy: fake
  faker_method: firstName
  faker_arguments: []

date_of_birth:
  strategy: fake
  faker_method: date
  faker_arguments: ["Y-m-d"]

hash

Replace values with a one-way hash. Hashing is useful when equal input values should remain joinable inside one run.

employee_number:
  strategy: hash
  algorithm: sha256

Hashing is pseudonymisation, not full anonymization. Prefer fake, null, or key remapping when linkage must be impossible.

mask

Reveal a small prefix and mask the rest.

phone:
  strategy: mask
  visible_chars: 4
  mask_char: "*"
  preserve_format: true

null

Set the column to NULL. The target column must allow null values.

notes:
  strategy: "null"

static

Use one fixed value for every row.

environment_tag:
  strategy: static
  value: "dev-imported"

Review responsibility

PII auto-detection is a starting point. You are responsible for reviewing generated rules before cloning production data.