In an age where screenshots and documents are frequently shared, ensuring private information stays hidden is crucial. Mac users often need to blur or redact sensitive data — such as personal identifiers, financial details, or account numbers — before sharing files. Doing this manually with basic tools can be time-consuming and error-prone. This is where BlurData comes in, offering a powerful macOS-only app for automatic data masking and redaction of sensitive content in screenshots and PDF files.
BlurData is a dedicated redaction software that uses intelligent pattern recognition to find and obscure confidential information in your screenshots and PDFs automatically. With its newest update, it even allows you to define custom regular expression (regex) patterns for detection, making it easier than ever to catch unique data formats. All processing happens entirely offline on your Mac, so your files and sensitive text never leave your device — ensuring top-notch privacy protection.
BlurData simplifies privacy protection by automating the redaction process on macOS. Instead of manually drawing black boxes or blurring text, the app scans your content and identifies sensitive details instantly. It can recognize common types of personal and sensitive information (like emails, names, addresses, phone numbers, financial figures, URLs, and more) without any manual input. This means you can quickly sanitize screenshots of conversations, financial documents, or any PDF containing private data with just a few clicks.
Key features of BlurData include:
One of the standout new features in BlurData is the ability to create custom regex rules for pattern detection. This is especially useful if you need to consistently hide a specific format of data — such as a particular ID number, customer code, or any uniquely formatted string that the default detectors might not cover. Simply input your own regex pattern, and BlurData will automatically search for matches in your screenshots or PDF text and blur them out. This level of customization ensures that no matter what kind of sensitive data you’re dealing with, you have a way to catch it.
Additionally, BlurData now supports batch redaction across multiple files. Whether you have a folder full of screenshots or a multi-page PDF document, the app can process them all at once. This batch processing capability means you can apply your redaction rules (including custom regex patterns) to a whole set of files in one operation, greatly streamlining your workflow. For instance, this feature makes large-scale PDF redaction on macOS easier than ever. Professionals handling many documents — like lawyers, educators, or IT professionals dealing with confidential records — will find batch redaction a huge time-saver.
Because BlurData performs everything locally on your Mac, it operates quickly and without privacy concerns. There’s no need to worry about uploading sensitive documents to an external server or cloud service. The software is designed exclusively for macOS, taking advantage of native performance and security. (Note: BlurData isn’t available on the Mac App Store; you can download it directly from the official website.) By using a dedicated tool like BlurData, Mac users can ensure robust privacy protection, effortlessly redacting sensitive information from PDFs and screenshots while keeping full control over their data.