Redact PDF
Black out names, numbers and anything else that must not be read - removed from the file, not just covered. Done on your own computer. Nothing is uploaded.
Drop your PDF here
They stay on your computer. Nothing is sent to a server.
How to redact a PDF
A document that needs redacting is, by definition, one you should not upload. Here it never leaves your computer.
- Drop the PDF here.
- Type a name or number and press Find to black out every copy of it, or drag across the page to draw a box.
- Go through the pages and check every box.
- Press Redact and save, then open the new copy and check it again.
Why a black box is not enough
Drawing a black rectangle over words in most editors only hides them from the eye. The words are still in the file, and anybody can select them and paste them somewhere else.
Here every page with a box on it is rebuilt as a picture, with the boxes painted in. What was under them is not in the file any more, in any form. Pages without boxes are kept exactly as they were.
What Find can and cannot see
Find reads the words stored in the PDF. A scanned page is only a photograph, with no words in it to find, so draw those boxes by hand, or run the file through OCR PDF first. Always look through every page yourself before sending.
Good to know
- Can the blacked-out words be recovered?
- No. The pages with boxes are rebuilt as pictures with the boxes painted in, and the old page with its words is not copied into the new file.
- Why can I not search the redacted pages any more?
- Because they are pictures now. That is the price of the words underneath being truly gone. Pages without boxes stay searchable.
- What else is removed?
- The hidden document details, such as the author and title, and the bookmarks. Those can carry names too.
- Is anything uploaded?
- No. Everything happens inside your browser.