Why a blur or marker on top is risky
Pixelating or blurring a region can sometimes be reversed, and a semi-transparent marker may leave the original visible underneath. If you crop in an editor and “undo” later, or share the layered file, the hidden content can resurface.
Scrubbr instead paints solid, opaque boxes onto the actual pixels and re-encodes the image from scratch. There is no layer to peel back and nothing underneath — the covered pixels are simply gone.
Metadata goes too
Because the redacted image is rebuilt from a flattened canvas, every metadata block — EXIF, GPS, camera info, timestamps — is dropped in the same step. Scrubbr verifies this by re-reading the output.
What you can redact
- Faces and identifying features in a photo.
- Names, addresses, account numbers and signatures in a screenshot.
- Anything visible you do not want shared — drawn as one or more boxes.
How to redact an image
- 1Open the image. Drop a JPEG or PNG onto Scrubbr; it loads locally.
- 2Switch to Redact. Choose the Redact action to draw on the image.
- 3Draw boxes. Drag rectangles over every sensitive area.
- 4Apply and download. Scrubbr burns the boxes in, strips metadata, verifies, and you download the result.
Frequently asked questions
Can the blacked-out area be recovered?
No. The pixels under each box are overwritten and the image is re-encoded from a flattened canvas, so the original content is not present in the output file.
Does redacting an image also remove its metadata?
Yes. Re-encoding the image drops all EXIF/GPS/XMP metadata, and Scrubbr confirms it on the output.