Redacting a bank statement can allow you to hide or remove confidential information – an important task that can fall to anyone in the business world, including in your role as a business owner. Whether you need to redact a bank statement as part of a legal process, or you need to redact an employee’s bank statement to train staff, there are plenty of reasons why redacting a bank statement may be necessary for a business.
Learning how to redact information from a bank statement and other confidential documents is vital to ensure compliance and data protection. If you need to submit bank statements, then the process of redacting information is to black out or hide sensitive information that could leave you exposed to several dangers when doing so.
A redacted bank statement allows you to use the financial information within to further your business/legal dealings whilst protecting yourself. Legislation in the EU requires financial institutions, and sometimes even yourself, to do this mandatorily to protect both you and the businesses you deal with. With all the advanced features available to modern day scammers, you can never be too careful with sensitive information.
This article explains how to redact information from bank statements, whether it is through Google Docs or standalone programs. We also highlight the dangers of not redacting sensitive information, as well as effective strategies to protect important information.
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What Does “Redacting” A Bank Statement Mean?
Redacting is not a practice exclusive to financial documents or financial institutions. A redacted document will have clear signs that it was edited, and sensitive info (such as personally identifiable information) will be marked for redaction, e.g. blacked out and invisible to the reader.
Redaction isn’t just used to protect details of a bank account, however. In courts, redacting sensitive information is useful to protect the names, contact details and personal information of both witnesses and victims. This ensures that the names of people in any supporting documents necessary for the court are protected, especially in cases where the individuals are not necessarily part of the dispute in question, but rather act as support in the process.
The Government, for example, may decide to release documents requested under the Freedom of Information Act but redact information it considers highly confidential.
For the purposes of this guide, we’ll just be focussing on redacting information from bank statements to ensure data protection and compliance as a business.
Why Would You Need To Redact Information From A Bank Statement?
The following are examples of scenarios where a redacted bank statement becomes necessary.
- Protection – When you have to present financial documents like your bank statements as requirements for a business deal. You can seek legal counsel to redact the information considered irrelevant to the deal if you want to protect certain information. Examples of such include your account number or the names of other account holders which may not be pertinent to the deal in question.
- Loan – When applying for a loan or financial assistance that does not require some personal details. You can submit a redacted bank statement that does not contain irrelevant details like your account number to protect yourself from a data leak whilst still providing all the info required for the business loan.
- Validation – If you are using your bank balance as proof of address for a business trip, for example. Some statements like your account number or transaction details are confidential in such a case and irrelevant to any visa you might be applying for. You can provide a redacted bank statement instead to protect yourself.
- Application – When your a potential new employer requests a copy of your bank statement to verify your identity or eligibility for the job. You might present redacted documents containing only relevant details to the job description.
What To Redact From Your Bank Statement?
Not every redacted bank statement will look the same, as many have different requirements based on the situation and certain info will be necessary to be included in some situations, and not so relevant in others. As a starting point, consider who is asking for your bank statement: what is highly confidential but unneeded? From there, it’s about considering what to keep in.
However, there is a balance to be met. Too much information left out of your redacted bank statement will raise questions as to its eligibility, or even authenticity. Remove confidential information that is not required or relevant only, anything that isn’t required but also not harmful should be kept in to prove relevancy of documents easily.
What Are The Dangers Of Not Redacting A Bank Statement?
To fail to redact bank statements before you give them off to others can put you at great risk, such as fraud and identity theft. You might be surprised at the damage a fraudster can do with the available information on the bank statement.
The following are some examples of what a bank statement submittal that hasn’t been redacted may result in:
- Credit Accounts – Fraudsters could open credit accounts in your name with financial institutions, apply for a loan, buy a car etc. This is called identity theft and is the major reason for presenting redacted bank statements where necessary.
- Use Information Against You: Forgetting to redact sensitive financi on your bank statement can also place you under direct risk. Business rivals could find leaked information from a bank statement that could compromise your business position and any competitive advantages you might previously have had.
- Invasive Marketing – Not redacting bank statements can open you up to targeted marketing. Customers’ nonpublic personal information can be used to find out about their spending habits and interests and use it to make a profit. Whilst they don’t commit fraud or use it for malicious purposes, this is a privacy invasion that will bring annoyance at the least.
Avoid disclosing information to the public alongside information that others could use to frame you for a crime or put you in a difficult financial position.
How To Redact A Bank Statement – Most Used Methods
Check out the different available methods on how to redact information from a bank statement, some of which vary according to the file formats the document is in.
Redacting By Pen
Redacting sensitive data from a bank statement by hand can seem like the easiest method. Using a black marker to black out confidential information on physical copies of your bank statement isn’t new, and is an accepted practice. Just print out the file, and cover up the parts you wish to conceal. From there, you could send it off, or hard copy/scan the redacted bank statement to forward it electronically.
A good check to make is to hold up the printed statement to the light to confirm the marker properly conceals the information beneath. Ensuring they are unreadable is key if you’re sending them off physically or else sensitive info or private data could still be found.
Making Edits With A PDF Editor
Alternatively, you can make edits to a bank statement PDF document. Perhaps this is surprising, but PDF documents editors come with their own redaction tools within the security tab.
This is likely one of the methods most people will opt to use, as it’s a convenient way of redacting a PDF bank statement. It cuts out any physicality or extra tools (such as a printer, scanner etc) from the task, and most businesses want to send things electronically anyway, so it just speeds up the process.
Redacting Through Banking App/Website
Some banking apps and websites allow you to redact information before downloading the statement. If you’re unsure, your bank should at least have a help desk that you can get assistance from fairly quickly to find out for sure.
Even if you’re unable, the bank themselves may point you to their most secure and convenient method to generate a redacted bank statement.
How To Redact A Bank Statement Using Adobe Acrobat
Adobe Acrobat has free versions, as well as a simple interface. It works by editing PDF software, getting you a redacted bank statement easily through built-in features.
- Open the PDF file in Adobe Acrobat. The toolbar should have an “Edit PDF” option. Select the “Redact” tool.
- Ensure you properly select all the information you want to hide. Click “Apply” and use the “Save As” option to store the edited PDF on your computer.
Be careful that you save your Edited PDF file as a new file to keep the old one separately for your personal or business records.
How To Redact A Bank Statement Using Microsoft Word
Let’s also check out how to permanently redact sensitive information on a bank statement using Microsoft Word.
- Open the document you want to edit in Microsoft Word. On the toolbar, right-click “Review” > “Protect Document” > “Restrict Editing”.
- Click “Yes, Start Enforcing Protection”.
- Enter a password to restrict unwanted access to the file.
- Proceed to select all the information you want to redact. You can either delete them or replace them with white space. Once that is done, click “File” > “Save As” to save the new redacted version.
With these advanced features, you can effectively hide private information from bank statements and other documents quickly and easily whilst using a tool most businesses have to hand.
How To Redact A Bank Statement Using Google Docs
The next alternative is learning how to redact information on a bank statement using Google Docs. This is a simple method like using Microsoft Word and is even easier to share.
- Open the document you want to edit in Google Docs. Click ‘Edit” > “Find and Replace”.
- A “Find” field appears. Enter the text that you want to redact in that space and leave the “Replace with” field blank.
- Right-click “Replace All” and you will have successfully removed all the instances of the text you want to redact. The document automatically saves in Google Docs and you can proceed to share with whoever requested it.
Using A Lawyer To Help With Redaction
Consider requesting professional legal help when confused about financial information, or other sensitive information, as failure to redact bank statements opens you up to risks, and redacting too much may make your efforts in applying for any business loans etc wasted.
A lawyer can assist with your document review and tell you what information needs to be removed to protect your privacy and personal information. As qualified legal experts, their experience can speed up the process and ensure your application is as effective as possible.
We would always urge you to seek legal counsel for situations where you have to redact information from a document to be submitted to a court. For instance, the court has strict rules about what information can be redacted on a bank statement. Acting otherwise can result in your documents being rejected or inadmissible in court, and causing court delays is not good for anyone, with legal consequences sometimes being the result.
Other Ways To Protect Your Sensitive Information
There are several other ways to protect sensitive information and prevent identity theft without redacting:
- Encrypt all your digital documents: the purpose of encryption is to ensure restricted access to documents that are not meant for everyone. Many word processing documents have these restrictions in place, such as Google Docs, which can allow you to set strict permissions on who can see, comment and even edit documents.
- Shred physical copies of sensitive documents: getting rid of documents through shredding helps to protect confidential information from getting into the wrong hands. This is a tried and true method of many businesses. When done with documents, the security risk they pose is removed by simply shredding physical copies of things such as old bank statements.
- Use VPN: VPNs hide your identity for you whenever you go to access the internet. You should avoid using unauthorised public WiFi to access personal information like bank accounts or statements. However, use a trusted VPN service if you must use public network access to further protect your personal and business information.
- Use a password manager for access codes: Many businesses have online accounts that they share among employees. A password manager eliminates the possible liability by generating hard passwords and storing them. This also rids you of the burden of having to remember passwords.
- Get secure online storage: Online storage systems with a good reputation, such as Google Drive, can help keep much of your sensitive information transaction details safe, whilst also giving you full control over who can access them.
Final Thoughts
A redacted bank statement is protection against the leaking of your sensitive information. Many ways of redacting bank statements exist, and you should make sure to do your research to find the most convenient method for you. Mask sensitive information and redact details wherever possible.
As a business owner protecting your own and your employee’s data is incredibly important. Learn what information can be redacted from certain business situations to prevent data from getting into the wrong hands and protect your business in the long term.
