How to share a document safely

Step by step

1. Redact what must not be seen. Open Redact PDF and drag boxes over names, addresses and numbers, or type words and tick the number options to find every match. The marked areas are painted black and the text underneath is deleted.Open Redact PDF
2. Check for hidden data. Add the redacted copy to PDF Privacy Check. It lists the author, software, comments, attachments and earlier saved versions, and removes them when you press Remove.Open PDF Privacy Check
3. Lock it with a password. In Protect PDF, type a password twice and save the locked copy. Share the password by a different route from the file itself.Open Protect PDF

Why is a black box not enough to hide text?

A box drawn over a page usually leaves the words underneath in the file, where they can be selected, copied or revealed by moving the box. Redact PDF redraws each marked page as an image with the marked areas solid black, and that image replaces the original page.

The trade-off is that redacted pages stop being searchable text. Pages without marks are kept exactly as they were.

How do I find every match?

Reading a long document by eye misses things. Type the names or words to hide, separated by commas, and tick Email addresses, Phone numbers or Long numbers for account and ID numbers. Press Find on all pages and review each match before you redact.

A scanned page has no text to search, so draw its boxes by hand. In either case, open the saved file and look at every page before you share it.

• Hide the same person's name everywhere, including headers and footers.
• Remember signatures, stamps and photographs; they are not text.
• Check page numbers and file names too, as they can hint at what is hidden.

What does the privacy check add?

A PDF carries more than its pages: document properties, the program that made it, comments with reviewers' names, attached files, entries in form fields and earlier saved versions that can contain deleted text. Redact PDF removes much of this by default, and PDF Privacy Check shows you what is left.

It does not read the text on your pages. Look at the pages yourself.

How should I send the password?

A password only helps if it travels separately. Send the file by email and the password by a call or a message. Use a long password of unrelated words, and keep a copy of the unprotected file, since a lost password cannot be recovered.

Questions