FIND AND REMOVE METADATA (HIDDEN INFORMATION) IN LEGAL DOCUMENTS

1. Applies to: Microsoft Office Excel 2016, PowerPoint 2016, Word 2016

a. Legal professionals are familiar with the concept of "discovery" and the requirements set
out by the courts for complying with discovery demands. They also understand that they are only
required to provide the documents and data set out in the discovery demand. Unfortunately, if
you are providing electronic versions of your documents, you may "discover" that you are
inadvertently supplying more information than you realize.

2. Metadata

a. Whenever you create, open, or save a document in Microsoft Word, the document may
store information — known as metadata — that you had no intention of including or disclosing
(this also applies to Microsoft Excel spreadsheets and Microsoft PowerPoint® files). Metadata is
used for a variety of legitimate purposes, and it adds functionality to the editing, viewing, filing,
and retrieving capabilities of Microsoft Office. However, if some of this information is passed on
to inappropriate parties (for example, opposing counsel), that disclosure can create adverse
consequences for you and your client. In order to avoid these consequences, you should make
yourself familiar with the types of metadata contained in your documents and take steps to
remove it whenever necessary.

b. Some examples of metadata that may be stored in your documents

Your name - Your initials -Your company or organization name

The name of your computer

 The name of the network server or hard disk where you saved the document

 Other file properties and summary information

 Non-visible portions of embedded OLE objects

 The names of previous document authors

 Document revisions

 Document versions
 Template information

 Hidden text or cells

 Personalized views

 Comments

3. Remove Personal or Hidden Information

a. Before you give others a copy of the document, it's a good idea to review
personal and hidden information, and decide whether it's appropriate to include. You
may want to remove some information from the document and from the document
file properties before you share the document with others.

b. Note  If you save a document in a file format that can be read by a great number of
programs besides Microsoft Word—for example, .txt, .htm, .mht, and .xml formats—any
personal information described in this topic is easily viewed by anyone who has permission
to open the file. By saving a document in a Word file format (.doc or .dot), even those
individuals with permission to open the file cannot necessarily find personal information
easily. For example, if changes to content are password-protected, only users who know the
password can see who has been granted permission to edit certain parts of the document.

4. File Properties Include Author, Manager, Company, and Last Saved By

a. Some Word features use the personal information in file properties. When you remove
this information, these features may not work as desired. Removing personal information
affects the following features:

 Send to Mail Recipient (for Review)

 Tracked changes
 Information Rights Management
 Online collaboration
 Document Workspace sites
 Letters and mailings
 Comments (names are removed)
 Metadata-based search engines, such as FindFast and Microsoft SharePoint Portal
Server search engines (documents can be indexed by limited data only, such as
content and title)

 Other hidden information - For example, hidden text, revised text, comments, or field
codes can remain in a document even though you don’t see such information or
expect it to be in the final version. If you entered personal information, such as your
name or e-mail address, when you registered your software, some Microsoft Office
documents store that information as part of the document. Information contained in
custom fields that you add to the document, such as an "author" or "owner" field, is
 not automatically removed. You must edit or remove the custom field to remove that
information.

5. Remove Personal Information from File Properties

a. When you use this procedure, the following personal information is removed from
your document:

 File properties: Author, Manager, Company, Last saved by.

 Names, date, and time associated with comments (comment: A note or annotation that
an author or reviewer adds to a document. Microsoft Word displays the comment in a
balloon in the margin of the document or in the Reviewing Pane.) or tracked
changes (tracked change: A mark that shows where a deletion, insertion, or other
editing change has been made in a document.): Names are changed to "Author." Date
and time are removed.
 Routing slip: The routing slip is removed.

 The e-mail message header that's generated with the E-mail button is removed.
 Versioning: The name under Saved by is changed to "Author."

1. On the Tools menu, click Options, and then click the Security tab.
2. Select the Remove personal information from file properties on save check box.
3. Save the document.

6. Remove Other Hidden Information by Checking the Following Features

a. Tracked changes and comments:

1. To quickly display tracked changes (tracked change: A mark that shows where a

deletion, insertion, or other editing change has been made in a document.) or
comments (comment: A note or annotation that an author or reviewer adds to a document.
Microsoft Word displays the comment in a balloon in the margin of the document or in the
Reviewing Pane.), click Markup on the View menu.

2. On the Reviewing toolbar (Alt + Shift F10), click Next , and then click Accept

Change or Reject Change to make the revisions permanent.

3. Accept or reject changes until there are no more tracked changes in the document.

b. Clicking Markup on the View menu will show or hide all markups (markup:
Comments and tracked changes such as insertions, deletions, and formatting changes.
View markup when you want to process tracked changes and comments. Print a
document with markup to keep a record of changes made to a document.) in the
document. When you show all markup, all types of markup and all reviewers' names will
 be selected on the Show menu.

c. If you hide a type of markup by clearing it on the Show menu, the markup
automatically appears each time the document is opened unless you clear the Make
hidden markup visible when opening or saving check box on the Security tab of the
Options dialog box (Tools menu). Even if you clear this check box, the markup is still in
the document and can be revealed by selecting the type of markup on the Show menu.

7. Text Formatted with the Hidden Attribute

a. To view hidden text (hidden text: Character formatting that allows you to show or
hide specified text. Microsoft Word indicates hidden text by underlining it with a dotted
line.), click Options on the Tools menu, click the View tab, and then select the Hidden
text check box under Formatting marks. To omit hidden text in a printed document, click
Options on the Tools menu, click the Print tab, and then clear the Hidden text check box
under Include with document. If you plan to distribute the document online, just delete
the hidden text as you would delete any other text.

8. Previous Versions of a Document

a. If you specified that Microsoft Word save one or more versions of your document in
the same file, those versions are saved as hidden information in the document, so that you
can retrieve them later. Because versions of a document are available to others and
because they do not remain hidden if you or someone else saves the document in another
format, you may want to remove the versions before you share the document.

b. If you want to keep the previous versions, save the current version as a separate
document, and then distribute only that document.
a. On the File menu, click Versions.
b. Click the version of the document you want to save as a separate file.
c. Click Open.
d. On the File menu, click Save As.
e. In the File name box, enter a name, and then click Save.
c. If you don't want to keep the previous versions, delete the unwanted versions, and
then distribute the document.
a. On the File menu, click Versions.
b. Click the version of the document you want to delete.
c. To select more than one version, hold down CTRL as you click each version.
d. Click Delete.

9. AutoText
 a. Because AutoText entries are stored in files, do not use AutoText entries to store
sensitive data in files that you distribute.

b. Do one of the following:

 1. To show or hide the field code (field code: Placeholder text that shows where
specified information from your data source will appear; the elements in a field that
generate a field's result. The field code includes the field characters, field type, and
instructions.) for a specific field, click the field or the field results (field results: Text
or graphics inserted in a document when Microsoft Word carries out a field's
instructions. When you print the document or hide field codes, the field results
replace the field codes.), and then press SHIFT+F9.
 2. To show or hide field codes for all fields in the document, press ALT+F9.

c. Because field codes can be visible to anyone reading your document, be sure that the
information you place in field codes is not information that you want kept private.

10. Fast Save

a. If you save a document with the ‘Allow fast saves’ check box selected and then open
the document as a text file, the document may contain information that you previously
deleted. This happens because a "fast save" appends the changes you make to the end of the
document; it doesn't incorporate the changes (including deleted information) into the
document itself.

b. To completely remove the deleted information from the document, do the following:

1. If you opened the document as a text file, close the text file and open the document as
a regular Word document.
2. On the Tools menu, click Options, click the Save tab, and then clear the Allow fast
saves check box.
3. On the File menu, click Save.

11. Random Number to Improve Merge

a. When you compare and merge documents, Microsoft Word uses randomly
generated numbers to help keep track of related documents. Although these numbers
are hidden, they could potentially be used to demonstrate that two documents are
related. If you choose not to store these numbers, the results of merged documents will
be less than optimal.

1. On the Tools menu, click Options, and then click the Security tab.
2. Clear the ‘Store random number to improve merge accuracy’ check box.
12. Exceptions to Document Protection

a. If you select a part of a protected document and grant permission to edit it, this
information is stored with the document. To help prevent this information from being
viewed, enforce protection with a password or with document encryption. In the Start
enforcing protection dialog box, do one of the following:

1. Click Password, and then type and confirm a password in the boxes provided.

2. Click User authentication.

13. Your Documents and Microsoft

a. Unless you send your document to Microsoft, Microsoft does not have access to any
information from your document.