How to remove hidden personal data in Microsoft Office

Every time you send a document to a colleague, you save it, proofread it, correct spelling and/or grammatical errors, and send it. It's a great habit to get into, and can certainly save time and energy down the line, if your work is always accurate. Publishers will love you (won't they?!). But what about the other information we might unintentionally provide when we submit a document?

Microsoft Office Which Office suite is best for you? Which office suite is best for you? You will be pressured to find an occupation that does not require word or number processing of any kind. And you may be wondering, is Microsoft Office really the best solution? Here are your options. Read More creates and maintains a metadata file attached to your document. Every time you send it, your details are forwarded to the recipient and anyone else the document goes to. This is fine in certain situations, but at other times it can be useful to cleanse your documents of any personal information before releasing them into the wild.

Let's take a quick look at how to clean up your documents with the Document Inspector feature. 10 Hidden Microsoft Word Features That'll Make Your Life Easier 10 Hidden Microsoft Word Features That'll Make Your Life Easier Microsoft Word is deceptively simple. You're fine as long as you activate a document and just type. But Microsoft Word wouldn't be the Swiss knife without its productive features. Read more about Microsoft Office.

What types of information are we talking about here??

Microsoft Office automatically stores various types of personal information, along with some other forms of hidden data. The data is not immediately obvious. It is not displayed next to your document; We're going to have to eradicate it. Office documents may contain the following forms of information:

• Comments, markups from tracked changes Top 20 apps to get students through a day at school Top 20 apps to get students through a day at school Whether you're In high school, enter college as a freshman, or complete an advanced degree, these apps should be at the top of your back-to-school shopping list. Read more, versions and annotations in ink.. If you've collaborated on your document, it likely contains revision marks, comments, and more from your work process. These snippets can allow other people to see who else has worked on the document, as well as what changes they have made.
• Document properties and personal information. . Document properties refer to the document's metadata, such as author, subject, and title. Document properties are largely just information that Office automatically generates and maintains whenever you work with a document. You can also include information related to the specific features you use with a document. For example, email headers. What can you learn from an email header (metadata)? What can be learned from an email header (metadata)? Have you ever received an email and really wondered where it came from? Who sent it? How could they know who you are? Surprisingly, much of that information can come from... Read More
• Headers, footers and watermarks. . Word documents and Excel workbooks can contain information in headers and footers. Likewise, watermarks can be added and hidden.
• Hidden text . Word documents can contain hidden text. That is, content that has been formatted as hidden text. If you're not sure, the document inspector can look it up.
• Hidden rows, columns and worksheets . In the same sense as a Word document, Excel workbooks can contain their own hidden content.
• Invisible content . Excel workbooks and PowerPoint presentations can contain elements. 7 Tips for Creating Professional PowerPoint Templates 7 Tips for Creating Professional PowerPoint Templates No one benefits from a boring PowerPoint presentation. Use these tips to ensure your efforts always engage your audience. Read More The document inspector can locate them for you.
• Content outside the slide. PowerPoint presentations can also contain content or objects that are not visible because they have been dragged off the side of the slide. This happens to a wide range of objects, including art, text boxes, buttons, and graphics.
• Presentation notes . If you're using all of PowerPoint's features 10 Creative Ways to Use PowerPoint for Self-Growth 10 Creative Ways to Use PowerPoint for Self-Growth Think outside the box. It demolishes the fact that PowerPoint is just a boring presentation tool. Let's find ten creative uses for it. Read More You may also not want to send them to anyone else, or have them show up during your big presentation.
• Document Server Properties . The document may contain additional document properties if you are using a Document Workspace site or a library based on Microsoft Windows SharePoint services.
• Custom XML data . Your document may contain hidden XML data; The document inspector can find it and remove it.

Obviously this is only a problem if you consider it one. Most people who create and send documents with Microsoft Office should have no problem with the information created along with their work. If you need to get rid of the information mentioned above, read on!

The document inspector

The Document Inspector 10 Microsoft Word Defaults You Can Optimize 10 Microsoft Word Defaults You Can Optimize A few simple optimization steps can amplify your productivity with Microsoft Word. We give you ten quick and easy settings for your daily tasks. Read More Its main functions are to locate and remove any additional data from your documents. Before using the document inspector, save your current document .

Once this is done, go to File> Information . You will be presented with a screen similar to this:

On the right side you can see some of the information generated by Microsoft Office:pages, editing time, myself as author. To remove this, go to Check for issues> Inspect the document . You will then arrive at the Document Inspector options panel. Check the options you need, followed by Inspect . Depending on the size of your document, this could take a moment.

Once the Document Inspector has done its job, you can remove any hidden data found. Look down at the list of documents. press Delete all in the sections you want to delete.

Once you have cleaned the hidden information from your document, you can save it. Try to reopen it and scan again to make sure all data is removed. Otherwise, you should now be clear of any identifying information you may have unintentionally sent in.

PLEASE NOTE: In Office 2007, the Document Inspector can be found under Office Button> Prepare> Inspect Document> Inspect . Be sure to save your work Before making any changes..

Can I prevent it from happening??

Yes, but it's a document-specific setting, which means you'll need to apply the settings to each document you create. To prevent Office from saving metadata with each document, go to File> Options> Trust Center> Privacy Options . Under Document Specific Settings, check Remove personal information from file properties on save .

As mentioned, this will prevent your current document's metadata from being saved, but you'll have to reapply it next time.

Document Inspector Overview

There are plenty of reasons to remove personal information from an Office file, whether it's a PowerPoint presentation, an Excel workbook, or a Word document. As Office 2016 has introduced 11 Office of 2016 FAQs Answered 11 Office of 2016 Questions Answered Office 2016 is coming up and it raises a lot of questions. Do you have to buy a subscription, can you upgrade now, and can you go back to Office 2013? We collect the most frequently asked questions and provide the tools to... Read More

At a minimum, consider where your document might end up and the information you're unknowingly providing to the next person.

Do you scrub your documents regularly? What is your reason for cleaning them? Let us know below!