Address Data Standardization Overview

Processing data using the Address data type includes both standardizing and matching on free-form address fields. The Master Index Standardization Engine can create the parsed, normalized, and phonetic values for address data. These values are needed for accurate searching and matching on address data. You can implement street address standardization and matching on its own, or within an application designed to process person or business information. Standardizing address information allows you to include address fields as search criteria, even though matching might not be performed against these fields.

Several configuration files are designed specifically to handle address data and define processing logic for the standardization and phonetic encoding process. These include address clues files, a patterns file, and a constants file. The United States address standardization engine is based on the work performed at the US Census Bureau. The clues files, in particular, are based on census bureau statistics.