OpenAI Privacy Filter
Tied for most recommended of 4 pii redaction tools
Small model that masks personal information and secrets in text, so it can run locally before data reaches external APIs. Critics note it can miss some data, about 4 percent, so it cannot be treated as proof of anonymization.
Small model that masks personal information and secrets in text, so it can run locally before data reaches external APIs. Critics note it can miss some data, about 4 percent, so it cannot be treated as proof of anonymization.
8 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 7
- criticize it
- 1
- approval share
- 88%
Recommended in 2 of 13 months
- November 2025: not recommended
- December 2025: not recommended
- January 2026: not recommended
- February 2026: not recommended
- March 2026: not recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: not recommended
- July 2026: not recommended
- August 2026: not recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 7 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, not met.
- 7 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 2 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, not met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Masks PII and secrets before sending data
“It is small enough to run locally, I would pass my request through it first before sending to any apis.”
Comment from 27 Apr 2026 in “DeepSeek v4” “a good example of a model that can be used to mask PII and secrets”
Comment from 10 May 2026 in “Local AI needs to be the norm” Praised as great and a big deal
“The privacy filter is great, but it leaves a gap for non-technical users.”
Comment from 28 Apr 2026 in “OpenAI model for masking personally identifiable information (PII) in text” “This looks to be a big deal for my use case.”
Comment from 22 Apr 2026 in “OpenAI Privacy Filter” Useful as an extension or pre-processing step
“It is small enough to run locally, I would pass my request through it first before sending to any apis.”
Comment from 27 Apr 2026 in “DeepSeek v4” “use the model from OpenAI directly as an extension”
Comment from 26 Apr 2026 in “OpenAI model for masking personally identifiable information (PII) in text”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Fails to redact about 4% of data
“How would you actually use this if it can fail redacting 4% of the data.”
Comment from 26 Apr 2026 in “OpenAI model for masking personally identifiable information (PII) in text”
Other pii redaction tools people recommend
The three most recommended other pii redaction tools, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| OpenAI Privacy FilterThis page | 7 | 1 | 88% | 2 | — | — |
| Rampart | 7 | 7 | 50% | 4 | — | — |
| Microsoft Presidio | 5 | 3 | 63% | 3 | — | — |
| PII-Shield | 5 | 0 | 100% | 2 | — | — |
What people said
7 of the 8 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“a good example of a model that can be used to mask PII and secrets”
“The privacy filter is great, but it leaves a gap for non-technical users.”
“It is small enough to run locally, I would pass my request through it first before sending to any apis.”
“This is not a tool which can be used to assume information is anonymized.”
“use the model from OpenAI directly as an extension”
“How would you actually use this if it can fail redacting 4% of the data.”
“This looks to be a big deal for my use case.”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.