Removing Hidden Personal Information From a Document

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated October 11, 2025)

In the past, Microsoft has come under fire because Word maintains quite a bit of identifiable information with each document. This information is not normally visible, but with a little bit of sleuthing, someone could locate the information. For example, the name of a document's original author is saved with the document, but is hidden. Looking at the document file using a program besides Word allows someone to quickly locate the author's name. The problem, of course, is that you may not want this information disclosed.

Beginning with Word 2002, Microsoft finally provided a way for you to stop personal information from being saved with a file. To make sure personal information is not saved with a document, follow these steps:

Choose Options from the Tools menu. Word displays the Options dialog box.
Make sure the Security tab is displayed. (See Figure 1.)

Figure 1. The Security tab of the Options dialog box.

Select the Remove Personal Information From This File On Save check box. (In Word 2003, the option is called Remove Personal Information From File Properties on Save.)
Click on OK.

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (1574) applies to Microsoft Word 2002 and 2003.

Author Bio

Allen Wyatt

With more than 50 non-fiction books and numerous magazine articles to his credit, Allen Wyatt is an internationally recognized author. He is president of Sharon Parq Associates, a computer and publishing services company. Learn more about Allen...

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