FOIA and public records
Redact records for FOIA and public records requests
Responding to a Freedom of Information Act or state public records request means releasing the record while withholding what an exemption covers, most often other people's personal information. RedactSnap finds names, contact details and ID numbers for you to review and removes them permanently, without sending the records to an outside processor.
Drop a record here, or click to choose
PDF, PNG or JPG
Opens in your browser. The file is never uploaded.
What Smart Scan flags in public records
Names of private individuals
Complainants, witnesses and members of the public, flagged by a named-entity model that runs in your browser. You decide which ones an exemption covers.
Contact details and SSNs
Email addresses, phone numbers and dashed US Social Security numbers are matched on every page.
Case and record numbers
Add your agency's formats, such as case numbers or badge numbers, as custom terms.
Scanned and photographed records
Pages without a text layer are read with OCR on your device. Handwritten notes still need a manual pass.
How to redact a record for release
- 1
Open the responsive record in the tool above. It stays on your computer.
- 2
Run Smart Scan and work through the findings, keeping only what an exemption applies to.
- 3
Box anything else that is exempt, such as deliberative passages or handwritten notes.
- 4
Export, check the verification view, and note the exemption for each redaction in your response letter or index.
Marking which exemption applies
Federal FOIA (5 U.S.C. § 552) asks agencies to show how much information was withheld, and under which exemption, on the released record where it is technically feasible. Many state laws have similar rules.
RedactSnap draws solid black boxes without labels, so each box shows where information was removed and roughly how much. If you need the exemption code printed on the page, record it in your response letter or a redaction index instead, or use a tool built for agency FOIA processing.
Why flattening matters for released records
Released records are often posted publicly, where anyone can try to copy text out from under a redaction. Agencies and courts have released PDFs whose black boxes could be lifted off. RedactSnap rasterises every page on export, so there is no text left under the boxes.
Frequently asked questions
Does RedactSnap decide what is exempt?
No. It finds candidate personal information quickly. Whether an exemption applies is a legal judgement for you or your agency's counsel.
Can I redact the same header on every page?
Yes. Draw a box once and choose to repeat it at the same position on every page, which is useful for letterheads, stamps and page footers.
Is my file uploaded anywhere?
No. RedactSnap reads the PDF with your browser's File API and processes it in memory on your device. There is no upload endpoint and no server-side copy of your document. You can confirm this by opening your browser's network tab while you redact.
Is the redaction permanent or just a black box on top?
Permanent. A black rectangle drawn in an ordinary PDF editor can be copied around or deleted, leaving the text underneath readable. RedactSnap exports every page as a flattened image, so the original text layer, fonts and hidden objects are not carried into the file you download.