If you really want to make sure that you fully protect your data and identity, one thing you may not know is that Microsoft Office documents store metadata which (although largely useful) could be linked back to you. There is an easy way to stop this from happening – here’s how:
For Microsoft Word, Excel, or PowerPoint:
– Click on ‘File’ (top left).
– On the Info page, click on ‘Check for Issues’.
– Click on ‘Inspect Document’ (which opens the Inspector window).
– Make sure all the checkboxes in the Document Inspector are checked.
– Click the ‘Inspect’ button.
– A green checkmark in a circle indicates that no data of that type has been found. A red exclamation mark means it found data of this type.
– Next to that data type’s description, click the ‘Remove All’ button.
– You can also click the ‘Reinspect’ button to make sure that nothing was missed.
