Using deterministic linking, what would happen if the last names differ between two records?

When using deterministic linking, matches between records are typically based on exact matches of specified identifiers. If the last names differ between two records, deterministic linking relies on the premise that an exact match is a requirement for a connection to be established. Therefore, if the last names are not the same, the records would not be considered a match. Deterministic linking does not allow for any variations or approximations in the data, which is why differing last names prevent a match from being identified.

In practice, this means that for a record linkage to be confirmed using deterministic methods, all critical fields being compared (including last names) must align exactly; hence, differing last names lead to no match being identified.