In daily life, we always need to share PDF files. These PDFs may contain sensitive information which we don’t want others to see. This might be bank account information, numbers, contracts, medical records, etc.
Learn how to redact a PDF will help you easily sharing the PDf file and black out the information from prying eyes.
Use redaction function in adobe acrobat is what most people recommended. But there are many ways to do it, One path you might not know about is you can do it within the MacOS Preview, which includes redaction feature that will blackout text permanently in PDF file. And for Windows users, one can easily use any free annotation tools to hide the information and then flatten the file so that others cannot edit or remove it.
In this article, we’ll show you how to redact a PDF file with or with out redaction tool in Adobe Acrobat. And we are happy to tell you that most of the options are totally free.
Cisdem PDFMaster
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We all know one can use the redaction tool in Adobe Acrobat to redact a PDF file, but it has many settings and complicated to use, also to use the redact function, one need to pay and subscribe for Adobe Acrobat which cost 239.88 per year.
Cisdem PDFMaster is an all in one PDF toolkit which comes with a full set of PDF handling tools. It has an build in PDF redaction tool which can help one quickly redact PDF files. With it you don’t have to worry about whether your text and images in PDF are really covered up or not. As the redaction is burned into the PDF and no one can retrieve the content. This fully meets legal or safe requirements for redacting a PDF file. Also, this tool can redact a PDF and keep the formatting.
Besides, you can utilize this software to create PDF, edit PDF, annotate PDF, protect and unlock PDF, build forms, OCR scanned documents, add digital signatures, even compress PDFs. It’s a great PDF converter, a convenient PDF editor, a professional measuring tool, even a master of all your PDF files.
Here, I have a notice written before the solutions. For information safe, a good redaction software will ensure that the redacted information is permanently removed from a PDF, so you can’t recover or undo the redaction. We recommend that you save a copy of the document under a different name.
Download and launch Cisdem PDFMaster on your Windows.
You can Redact specific parts of a PDF, like:
You can also choose to redact the entire page, redact multiple pages or certain pages of a PDF file.
Redact a Scanned PDF
This app also supports redact scanned PDF files, and the steps are the same.
Change PDF Redaction Settings
Unlike most of the tools which only supports black out, PDFMaster’s redaction setting supports change the redaction color and place comment for the redacted area.
Add comment for the redaction
Check the "Use Overlay Text" box and enter the text you need.
Here you can also click the color box to change the appearance of the redaction.
Mac’s build in PDF reader - Preview can also work as a handy free PDF editor which comes with PDF redaction tool. Note that this redaction tool was introduced in macOS 11 “Big Sur”. If you Mac system is in macOS 11 or later you can just follow the steps below.
If your system is older than that, we also introduced how you can use the marker tool to redact text in PDF on Mac.
Note: Don’t just “Save” after adding these redaction actions, otherwise, these redaction actions will canceled so no information will be hidden or removed.
For Windows users, LibreOffice is the free tool that supports redact and black out private information. It is totally free to use and it has a build in redact function that supports add rectangle, free form to hide information in PDF and one can choose to export the redacted PDF in white or black. The downside of this option is that sometimes in will load PDF files in a mess (you can see in the below screenshots our PDF show a strange logo in the top) and the output quality has a low resolution than the original PDF.
Just like black out information in a paper and then scan it, we can also use free PDF annotation tools like PDF-XChange Editor to blackout information in PDF files and then use Microsoft print to flatten the PDF so that others who receive the PDF can not move the black rectangle, delete it or make it transparent.
Download the free portable version of PDF-XChange Editor here: you can find the download link right below the version information just choose 32 bit or 64 bit according to your needs.
For subscribed Adobe user, the redaction tool in Adobe Acrobat Pro DC will easily redact sensitive information in PDF.
For Windows users, Microsoft Word also supports redact and black out private information. Word’s redaction tool will place a black box over selected text or images and make sure that the information has been removed.
For PC and mobile users, we can also utilize online site to redact PDF.
AvePDF is a web-based application that provides 50+ tools to process any document online. Other than redacting PDF, this online sites offers high-level features such as capturing document from scanner, annotate a PDF, reduce PDF file size, hyper-compression, e-signature, add links to page, and advanced OCR.
It has an maximum upload size of 128MB, much larger than the other online sites and this is sufficient for most uses.
To help people rest assured they promise that they use automatic detection. That it, all documents are automatically deleted from this web after 30 minutes.
How to Redact a PDF Online Free?
In PDF publishing, the process of blacking out confidential information is called redacting. It is thought that the word was originally derived from the act of blacking out sensitive information in a paper with black ink.
Some sites and tools claim that they can redact PDF, but the truth is that they only blackout the information and focusing on the visual outcome, but still this information can be recovered and located.
To ensure that the redacted information is completely removed from a PDF, there are two steps you can take to verify that all sensitive information has been securely redacted.
You can try to search for any keywords or phrases you have redacted in the PDF file and check if it can still be searched, if you can still search and locate the information, then, this is not a real redaction.
We can also try to copy and paste the blackout information and see if it can be copy and pasted.
These two black out in the PDF documents look the same when viewed with a PDF reader.
However, when you select each blacked out part, copy it, and paste the text into Notepad, you will get the following result.
From the above part, you know that if you use a real redaction tool, the information is permanently deleted and unrecoverable, so be sure to make a copy of the document before the redaction.
There are a part of users point out that they can’t redact text in PDF and don’t know why. If you are in a situation that the redaction tool button turn gray and don’t allow you to click on it. Go to File > Properties > Security, you can see if the file has some permissions set before. There is a high probability that the file has been set with permission to prohibit comments, so that the text cannot be redacted. In this case, find the permission creator to unlock the restriction. If the file is restricted to editing text only, redaction will generally not be affected. In addition, both scanned files and interactive files can successfully applying redaction.
One can also add password to a PDF file. And there are two kinds of PDF password
PDF open password: Just like the name this means you add a password to a PDF file and control who can open the PDF file.
PDF Permission Password: With a permission password you can set limit on PDF printing, copying, pasting, editing, etc.
You can use tools like preview and PDFMaster to add password to a PDF file.
And that's all there is to redact a PDF. All this 7 free method can keep sensitive information in PDF away from those who shouldn't be able to view it.
PDF security is a vital part of business process. When redacting a PDF document, don't just black it out, make sure to use professional PDF redaction software that permanently erase the data.
If you want an easy and safe offline option, Cisdem PDFMaster is your best PDF assistant, it can safely redact a PDF file and it offers all it functions for user to test for 7 days. Just download and see how it can help you edit and redact a PDF file.
Free Download Windows 11/10/8/7 Free Download macOS 10.11 or later
Connie has been writing for Mac productivity and utility apps since 2009. Each review and solution is based on her practical tests, she is aways energetic and trustworthy in this field.
Frank
I didn't use Adobe because it's really expensive for me, and I need a more affordable editor to redact my PDF. I think the professional editor in Cisdem you mentioned can meet my needs.