Question 1

Is my data sent anywhere?

Accepted Answer

No. Redaction runs 100% in your browser using JavaScript and pdf-lib. Your PDF never leaves your device, and the tool works offline once the page is loaded.

Question 2

Is the redaction permanent?

Accepted Answer

Yes. The tool draws a solid filled rectangle over each redacted area in the PDF's page content. The original text under the rectangle is not removed from the content stream, however — for true irreversible removal you should also use the metadata stripper and verify by selecting text in the redacted area (it should not appear). For maximum security with scanned/linked content, consider flattening afterwards.

Question 3

What extra features?

Accepted Answer

18 extras: text-search and area-coordinate redaction (plus 'both' mode); 3 redact colors (black, white, dark-gray); redaction validator with page-bounds checking; metadata stripper; redaction-count and redacted-area calculators; text + CSV reports; copy & download; localStorage history (max 20); shareable URL with encoded redactions; summary stats; redaction completeness checker; page-range filter; sensitive-data pattern detector (credit cards, SSN, email, phone); auto-redaction suggestions; and a redaction-strength verifier.

Question 4

Can I redact a specific phrase everywhere in the document?

Accepted Answer

Yes. List one phrase per line in the 'Text to redact' box, choose text-search or both mode, and the tool will scan each page's content stream for occurrences and draw a black rectangle over the matching region. Because pdf-lib does not provide direct text-position APIs, the tool falls back to redacting whole text-show operators that contain the phrase.

Question 5

What coordinate system does area redaction use?

Accepted Answer

PDF user-space units, origin at the bottom-left corner of each page, Y increasing upward. Enter one redaction per line as: page,x,y,width,height (all numbers). Page is 1-based. The validator warns if a rectangle exceeds the page bounds.

PDF Redaction Tool

How to use