For example, instead of noting the personal information of a customer: “Amy Hempel, 1031 SW Park Ave”, you may replace it with “[INFORMATION REDACTED]” or simply “[REDACTED]”. You can also place black squares or rectangles over information you want to redact. The black squares can be created by drawing long squares over the removed text areas and coloring them solid black. Make sure you delete the text underneath the black squares to ensure the black squares cannot be removed somehow to reveal the information. Make sure you do this for all instances and all variations of the information. You may need to do this manually if you use someone’s name in different ways throughout the document. For example, you may list “Amy Hempel” as “A. Hempel”, “Amy Hempel”, and “Ms. Hempel”. You will need to redact all instances of her name. You can do a find and replace search for every variation of her name or go through the document manually and replace them all with [REDACTED]. Save this version of the document as the “Temp-redacted” version. This will ensure you have two copies of the document, one with the original information and one with the information redacted.
Select all the text in the text file. (CTRL-A or Edit > Select All) Copy the text in text file. (CTRL-C or Edit > Copy) Paste the text into Notepad. (CTRL-V or Edit > Paste) Save the file in Notepad as the “Text-redacted” version. It will be saved as a text (. txt) file. If you do not have Windows Notepad, you can use WordPerfect, WordStar, and Text Editor.
To reformat the document, you must close the Notepad file and open the “Text-redacted” text document in your word processing program. Reformat the text in the word processing program but do not change any of the text.
Convert the text file to a PDF by choosing the PDF format in the list of save file as options. Select PDF and save the file as the “Final-Redacted-PDF” version. Delete the “Text-redacted” and “Temp-redacted” versions so there is no paper trail to the original redacted information. You can now use the “Final-Redacted-PDF” version as the redacted file.
The redaction tool option is only available for Adobe Acrobat Pro. It is not available for Adobe Acrobat Reader. [6] X Research source You can try a plug-in made for other versions of Adobe Acrobat, such as Redux. These plug-ins or add-on software can be used to redact information in a PDF file using other versions of Adobe Acrobat. If you have access to the document as a text file, you can go through the redaction process for a text file and then use the final redacted PDF. However, if you only have access to the PDF file and need to redact the PDF file, you will need to try this method.
To redact a line or item in the document, double-click on a word or image. Press CTRL as you drag to select a line, a block of text, an image, or an area of the document. Click OK to remove the selected items. Keep in mind the items are not permanently removed from the document until you save the document.
Hidden text can appear as the original text or a version of the original text. Metadata may look like coded text, where there are numbers or symbols within the original text. Repeat this process until you have removed all the necessary content from the PDF document. Make sure you remove any hidden text or metadata as well.
Once you save the redacted document, you should delete the unredacted document. You should now have a redacted PDF version of the document that has no hidden text or metadata. This will ensure that no one can access the original, unredacted document.
Keep in mind this method may be time consuming if you have many pages of a paper document that you need to redact. However, this is considered the most effective way of redacting information from a document, whether it is a text file, a PDF, or a scanned document.
You should then shred the paper clippings to ensure the cut out information cannot be traced or found.
You can also use opaque paper that does not allow any light reflection, not plain-paper as a scanner can pick up images through the paper. Use tape or glue to attach the paper over the redacted sections.
Social Security numbers. If you must include someone’s Social Security number, only use the last four digits. Any financial account numbers. If you must include financial account numbers, use only the last four digits. The names of minors. If you must note the minor involved, use the minor’s initials only. Dates of birth. If the individual’s date of birth must be included, only include the year. Home addresses. If the individual’s address must be noted, such as in a criminal case, use the city and state only.
If you are dealing with very sensitive information that could have legal implications, you may want to consider using a redaction expert. These individuals are trained to do redactions and can verify the document for you to ensure it contains no errors or mistakes.
Select text several lines above your redacted area and ending one to two lines below it. Paste the content into a word processing document or in Notepad. Check to see if the redacted text is not present in the content. If it is not present, the redaction has been a success.
