AuthorTec Redactor

Find Confidential Numbers

Documents often contain control numbers that should remain confidential and thus subject to redactions. These include Tax ID numbers such as Social Security Numbers and Corporate ID numbers, Passport numbers, Passport Card Numbers, Visa numbers, Telephone numbers, Credit Card numbers and others. This function of AuthorTec Redactor searches the document using a formatting pattern of these types of data. For example, a Social Security number (a personal TAX ID in the USA) has a format pattern of 999-99-9999 and this function searches the document for content that fits this pattern.

Once finding content that fits the requested pattern, the content is highlighted in a Dark Yellow highlight color. The located content is not redacted, it is only highlighted. We do it this way so you can verify that the correct data/full data was found. Once verified, you use the Redact Selection button from the Ribbon to redact it or the Remove Redaction to clear the highlighting.

USING THIS DIALOG

1. Mark the checkboxes of the pattern types of number content you wish to locate.

2. Press the OK button to begin the search.

3. A summary result of the search appears in the message area on the dialog. It tells you how many patterns it found.

4. The located content that fits the selected patterns are highlighted in the document.

5. Use the Blue LEFT and RIGHT Arrows (forward and backward) to move between the highlighted content. It "selects" the next found highlight.

6. If the highlighted selection is correct you can click the Redact Selection button from the Ribbon to mark it for redaction. If you need to increase or decrease the selection area, you can do so, and then click the Redact Selection button. If you don't want to redact this particular selection, use the Remove Redaction button to clear the highlighting.

7. Use the Close button to exit this dialog.

CUSTOM NUMBER PATTERNS

Included in the various pattern categories, Tax ID, Passport, etc. are patterns for not only the United States control numbers, such as Social Security or Passport numbering, but also the pattern formats for many other countries including Canada, Mexico, United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, EU countries, India, and China. If we missed your country or if you have formatting patterns for other control data, these can be added and then included in the search critera by marking the Custom Number Patterns checkbox. 

The pattern coding the AuthorTec Redactor software uses is Microsoft Word Wildcard coding. It looks like the following for a Wildcard search for US Social Security numbers: 

[0-9]{3}\-[0-9]{2}\-[0-9]{4} 

Add your custom wildcard search strings to the following file:  

C:\Users\<Your User ID>\AppData\Roaming\Great Circle Learning\AuthorTec <add-in name>\#.0\MASTER\Writers Collection\ATec_Redactor_Custom_Patterns.txt

Each custom wildcard search string must be on a separate line in the text file. Do not include blank lines between strings. An example is below: 

[0-9]{8,9}

[A-Z]{2}[0-9]{7}

[A-Z]{1}[0-9]{2} [0-9]{5} 

The above example is searching three patterns of control numbers. The first control number pattern finds all eight- or nine-digit numbers. The second pattern finds all control numbers that begin with two capital letters followed by seven numeric digits. The third pattern finds all control numbers that begin with one capital letter, followed by two numeric digits, followed by a blank space, followed by five numeric digits. 

For further information about writing Wildcard search strings, you can search the Web for Microsoft Word Wildcards Search and Replace