Starkive StudioRedaction
Black it out so it is actually gone.
- Content removed, not covered
- Hidden text too
- Source file untouched
Mark the words you want removed and Starkive deletes the content underneath rather than painting a rectangle over it. It runs on your machine, in the same sandbox as everything else, and writes a new file so your original is never touched.
Marking up a document is free. Writing the redacted copy is part of the $1.99 unlock, inside Starkive PDF.
What it does.
- 01
Removes the content, not the view
In many tools a redaction box is a black rectangle drawn over text that is still sitting in the file, and anyone can select it straight back out. Starkive removes what is underneath, so it cannot be copied, searched or extracted.
- 02
Two routes, and you can see which you got
When a mark covers a whole object — in practice usually a whole line — that object is deleted and the rest of the page stays live, selectable text. When it covers only part of one, that page is flattened to an image instead. The content is gone either way; what differs is what you get back.
- 03
It refuses rather than guesses
A mark across half a line has only two honest outcomes: delete text you did not mark, or keep text you did. Starkive takes neither and flattens that page — lossy, but never leaky.
- 04
Hidden text counts too
Content is judged by where it sits, not by whether you can see it. Text underneath an image, drawn white-on-white, or sitting in an invisible OCR layer is removed like anything else. That is exactly where naive redaction leaks.
- 05
The original is left intact
Redaction always writes a new file. Your source PDF is never modified in place, so a slip is never destructive.
A flattened page stops being text
If a page had to be flattened it becomes an image: still readable and printable, but no longer searchable or selectable, and the file gets bigger. You can run Make searchable on it afterwards to put a text layer back — recognised from what is still on the page, never from what was removed.
The others come with it.
One app, one $1.99 unlock. These are not add-ons and there is no upgrade path between them — you either have Studio or you do not.
Starkive Archive
Lock a file or folder with strong encryption — a password ZIP, a 7-Zip archive, age, or OpenPGP. It reads 13 archive formats too, so it is the only unzip tool you need as well.
Starkive PDF
A PDF is a program format, and opening one is where most of the risk in a document workflow actually sits. Starkive decodes every file in a separate process that cannot reach the network, read your files or start anything. Above that line it behaves like the desktop editor you already know.
Starkive Vault
One master password you choose, never stored and never sent. Every record is sealed on your own machine, so there is no account to breach and nothing in a cloud to leak.
Authenticator
Keep your two-factor secrets next to the passwords they protect. Codes are generated on your device to the TOTP standard, sealed by the same Argon2id and AES-256 vault, and unlocked with Windows Hello or Touch ID.
Trust Split
Break a passphrase, recovery phrase or exported key into shares using Shamir's Secret Sharing. You choose how many shares exist and how many are needed to rebuild it; anything fewer reveals nothing at all. It runs entirely on your machine.
Back to Starkive Studio, or see both products.