Remove personal details before sending an AI prompt
Before pasting a document into an AI service, ask how much it needs to answer your question. A short made-up example may do the job. Personal info redactor can help prepare your text in this browser. It doesn't send anything to an AI service.
1. Make a shorter working copy
Keep the original private. Cut paragraphs, customer records and message history that don't help explain the question. Never use a real password, access token, recovery key or private share link as an example. Replacing the whole example can be easier than hiding details one at a time.
2. Use the same replacement for repeated details
Paste your working copy into Personal info redactor and turn on AI-prompt privacy mode: use consistent placeholders. A repeated email address gets the same label each time in this text, such as [EMAIL-1]. That helps the reader follow who did what. This step stays in your browser and makes no AI request.
3. Add the private names yourself
Enter names, addresses or other terms under Also hide these names or words. Put companies under Company names and projects under Project names. Separate entries with commas, and check shortened names and different spellings too. The tool accepts up to 100 custom terms and 200,000 characters of text, but it can't guess every private reference.
4. Read what the story still gives away
Check exact dates, job titles, unusual events, internal web addresses and combinations of details that could identify someone. Remove or make less specific anything the question doesn't need. Also check what the tool replaced: a broad term may hide useful words and make the prompt hard to follow.
5. Look over text from other sources
Hidden characters can help you find supported invisible characters and look-alike letters in unfamiliar pasted text. It can't tell you that every instruction in the text is safe. Read the visible instructions and quoted material yourself, especially before letting an AI tool take actions or open other files.
6. Choose what to send to the AI service
Copy only the output you've checked. Read the chosen service's current rules for storing prompts, training, sharing and workplace use on your account. Cleaning text here doesn't change those rules. If you keep a private list matching labels to real people, keep that list out of the prompt.
Good to know
Replacement labels don't make a story anonymous. Names and other clues can remain, and the context may identify someone. This guide covers the text you checked. Review attachments, screenshots, earlier messages and connected files separately before letting an AI service use them.