---
title: "Case-Insensitive Name/Alias Collapsing"
url: "https://www.opensanctions.org/changelog/22/"
id: "22"
date_created: "2025-06-18T08:57:59.284Z"
date_effective: "2025-07-01"
breaking: false
categories: ["Export formats"]
---

# Case-Insensitive Name/Alias Collapsing

We are starting deduplicate name variants that differ only in letter-case. If an entity lists several names whose only variation is capitalization (e.g. `VLADIMIR PUTIN`, `Vladimir Putin`, `vladimir putin`), we will keep just the variant closest to title-case (Vladimir Putin) and omit the others.

*Why?* Reduces noise and file size, and makes downstream matching more intuitive.
*Scope affected:* all exports (CSV, JSON, Senzing) and API responses; you will see fewer aliases.
*Compatibility:* no schema changes, only redundant values are removed. If you relied on the presence of case-only variants, review your unit tests.

We are also removing some invalid name values from the dataset, including names that consist of single-character, non-letter names.