TechnoEsq has been quite busy as of late presenting at numerous seminars concerning the usage of various technologies and software applications in law offices. One of the most important things espoused at these seminars is the confidentiality of electronic documents, with PDF redaction taking the forefront. It would seem the FBI needs to attend one of our seminars.
According to University of Pennsylvania professor Matt Blaze, the Justice Department’s Inspector General’s office failed to properly redact data in it’s March report concerning the FBI’s final allocation of the $500 million given to help telephone companies retrofit their old switches to make them compliant with the Communications Assistance to Law Enforcement Act (CALEA).
TechnoEsq has examined the document in question and was able to recover all information ‘redacted’ from the document. This information included amounts paid to Verizon for new switches as well as logs of HelpDesk complaints made concerning the FBI’s online website.
This further reinforces the importance of proper redaction of PDF’s in any office environment dealing with confidential material, as in a law office. To further assist our readers, we will be creating a short tutorial detailing how to properly redact a PDF using Acrobat 8.0. This will be in the coming weeks once TechnoEsq has made the switch to our new location at TechnoEsq.com/blog. Until then, be sure to check out TechnoEsqPresentations.com to get a peak at what will replace our main page here at TechnoEsq and see what new services we are providing.
In the meantime, Finis Price, co-founder of TechnoEsq will be writing about redaction in the next edition of the Kentucky Justice Association’s “The Advocate”.