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July 17, 2009
Redaction Tips and Techniques for Acrobat 9
Redaction is the permanent deletion of privileged or sensitive information from documents. Acrobat 8 Pro introduced a comprehensive set of Redaction tools to the product. Acrobat 9 added additional tools and capabilities.
In this article, I'll discuss three tips and techniques for working with redactions in Acrobat 9 Pro:
- Setting a preference so that redacted files are automatically renamed DOCNAME_redacted.pdf.
- Creating a new document which summarizes redactions
- Setting a Preference to automatically copy selected text into the Redaction Comment
Want to know how Redaction works in Acrobat? |
|
Watch a brief Redaction tutorial on my Legal Movie Page. |
Watch a one-hour Redaction and Metadata Removal eSeminar |
December 24, 2008
Updated Redaction Pattern Sets Available
In my Custom Redaction Pattern article, I discussed how you can create new, customized redaction patterns to find specific types of information.
In that article, I pointed out that at the time we shipped Acrobat 9, Adobe didn't include patterns for Canadian Postal Codes or Social Insurance numbers.
Fortunately, Adobe has posted revised patterns which you can install to offer specific patterns for use in Canada, the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Japan. (The article ID is kb405632).
The link above has all the information you need to download and install the updated patterns.
Note: If you've previously created custom patterns be careful. The updated pattern will overwrite your existing pattern file if you simply replace it. Make sure you follow the instructions to rename your existing file first.
November 11, 2008
Acrobat and Reader 8.13 Available: Redaction Overlay Issue Fixed
Adobe Reader 8.13 and Adobe Acrobat 8.1.3 are now available:
Product |
Update Link |
Acrobat 8 Win |
|
Acrobat 8 Mac |
|
Adobe Reader (All) |
The Adobe Acrobat/ Reader 8.1.3 update addresses a number of customer workflow issues and security vulnerabilities while providing more stability.
Note: Acrobat 9.0 and Adobe Reader 9.0 do not require a security update.
What's fixed?
The Acrobat/Adobe Reader 8.1.3 Release Notes contain an exhaustive list of the fixes.
There is one fix that has been eagerly awaited in the legal community.
Acrobat 8 sometimes did not display overlay text after redactions were applied to image-only PDFs. This was only a display issue as all information was absolutely, and securely, redacted.
I've written a bit more about the issue below if you'd like to read on.
August 13, 2008
Creating and Using Custom Redaction Patterns
Acrobat 9 introduced several new redaction enhancements, including pattern-based redaction. Using this feature, it is easy to find and redact:
- Social Security Numbers
- Email addresses
- Phone numbers
- Dates
- Credit card numbers
The five "patterns" listed above are not very comprehensive, especially if you are Canadian!
There is no out-of-the-box there is no support for Canadian Social Insurance Numbers and Postal Codes.
Fortunately, it is possible to add your own patterns with a bit of work. In this article, I'll discuss how to create and add your own patterns.
If that's too geeky for you, at the very end I've included an already customized Redaction pattern file that is ready to go for Canada.
October 5, 2006
Acrobat 8 New Features: Redaction
Redaction is the permanent deletion of data from documents.
Documents are redacted in order to maintain privacy, censor state secrets, or protect intellectual property.
I have written about Redaction previously in this blog ( Redacting PDFs | Redaction Part 2: Something Else You Shouldn't Do ) pointing out the dangers of improperly redacting files.
Acrobat 8 Professional now make many of the dangers and workarounds moot, so this is a welcome tool for the legal market.
The new redaction tools are quite powerful. Let's take a look…
February 6, 2006
Redaction Part Two: Something Else You Shouldn't Do
I've received several comments about my article on redaction advocating a different method of producing the redacted PDF.
Wouldn't it be easier to just add mark-ups covering information and print it to the AdobePDF print driver instead of saving to a TIFF file?
Doesn't this "flatten" the file eliminating information underneath giving the same results?
Let me state this clearly: No it doesn't!
Read on to learn why . . .
Note: This article was written before Acrobat 8 shipped which includes built-in bullet-proof redaction tools.<\p>
December 16, 2005
Redacting PDFs
Redaction, by definition, means removing information from documents. In the old days of paper, xacto knives were used to cut text from the paper and it was then photocopied with a black sheet of paper behind it.
As numerous folks have found out, covering up information in an electronic file is not the same as deleting it.
Note: This article was written before Acrobat 8 shipped which includes robust tools for detecting improper redactions (Acrobat 8 Standard and Pro) and full-featured Redaction tools (Acrobat 8 Professional).<\p>