How Omitly removes text permanently

Drawing a black box over text is not redaction. In most PDF tools the rectangle is just a shape drawn on top — the words are still in the file underneath, and anyone can recover them by copying the text, removing the annotation, or reading the raw PDF. Omitly does not work that way.

What Omitly actually removes

When you redact a region and save, Omitly:

1. Deletes the underlying content — the text runs and image data inside the redacted area are removed from the PDF, not merely covered.
2. Scrubs related metadata that could leak what was there.
3. Runs an independent check over each redacted region to confirm nothing recoverable survives inside it before the file is written.

The result is a PDF where the redacted content is not present in the output — you can copy, search or inspect the raw file and it is not there to find.

How you know it worked

Omitly does not ask you to take this on trust. Every save writes a signed audit report — embedded in the redacted PDF — recording each region, the per-region check result, and hashes of the input and output documents. Anyone can open the file in Omitly and verify that report on their own machine.

See How to verify a redacted PDF for the check, and What the redaction certificate proves for exactly what that evidence does and does not cover.

A note on scope

The check is about the output document — that the redacted content is not present in the file you save and share. It is a technical fact about that one file, not a claim about other copies, drafts, email or backups you may hold elsewhere. Handling those remains your responsibility.