What Are Document Redaction Services?

Institutions of all varieties have been scanning documents into electronic formats for years. It makes the information easier to store and use. The issue of privacy arises with many of these documents containing sensitive and confidential data. Document redaction is the process of removing the sensitive information in a document. Some organizations also refer to this process as “sanitizing.” A document redaction service can do the work for you.

This is a function of the increased access to the documents and to correct more lax privacy policies that were acceptable before the widespread problem of identity theft. With so many companies opting for paperless offices, redacting is becoming common for any organization to protect privacy. It helps to ensure you don’t release sensitive information by accident.

When to Use Document Redaction

Electronic health records regularly utilize document redaction.

While it is beneficial for a medical office to share patient charts with the entire practice, the patient should still feel safe knowing that their private information remains private.

When you convert files from physical to electronic records, the sensitive information they contain should be redacted to keep the patient safe from cybercriminals and privacy concerns, while protecting the institution from legal suits.

You should redact any public records that also contain pieces of individual or business information before distribution.

Specific redaction allowances and laws vary by state. Some examples of items that you can redact include:

• Driver license numbers
• Dates of birth
• Social Security numbers
• Criminal identification information and national crime information numbers
• Addresses and phone numbers
• Victims, witnesses, and court personnel
• Medical or psychiatric information
• Financial information
• Account numbers
• Any other personal identifying information

Document redaction should not just cover text or images with another image—it should be removed from the image completely. This prevents sensitive information from showing up in the revision history of the document which can be easily removed by software.

How Document Redaction Services Work

Most document redaction takes place in two steps. The first one is done via software. Optical character recognition (OCR) software converts the digital image to text.

The text is run through software to look for specific patterns. The software selects and removes items like social security numbers or phone numbers.

The level of access to the documents and the sensitivity of the information will determine how thoroughly you need to review the documents. However, removing social security numbers from a public website has a very low threshold for acceptable errors.

Document redaction requires special software. Therefore, a document redaction service involves hiring a service provider that specializes in document redaction. A reputable company will ensure that the job is not only done correctly but also provides specific steps to ensure documents are secure throughout the entire process.

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