Forum Discussion

Brass Contributor

Aug 12, 2022

Is there shared best practice to randomize sensitive numeric data for Excel ?

How to randomize sensitve numerical data in Excel while maintaining existing data format(s) for public post? This is to supply Technical Support all information (format, shape ) except confidenti...

excel

Formulas and Functions

office 365

sunnyschindler

Brass Contributor

Aug 15, 2022

mtarler

Thanks for suggestion. Because PowerPoint compare do not cover text within image (Financial Spreadsheet with Arial Size 2.5) prompt me to try other ways such as Office Word OCR or Adobe Export to Spreadsheet. However, even Adobe Export is less than 100% accurate for Arial size 2.5.

To present this problem to Technical Supports who are unable to replicate my problem, I need to supply as much information as possible but maintain confidentialality.

Without in-depth understanding what affects OCR accuracy, my guess is to provide worst combination of 6 digit length of financial numerics (used with Percentage and Minus Signs) but have not yet find documented of such combination; IMHO, I am assuming random numerics is better than your suggested series of numeric 1s...

Your further support will be much appreciated!

mtarler

Silver Contributor

Aug 15, 2022

I'm not following the root issue here. Maybe you should ask the community about the main/root problem you are having. I don't understand what you are trying to do with powerpoint, word or adobe. It sounds like you are doing OCR but then I don't understand how excel comes into play.
w/r to the question about random digit replacement the second formula I gave will do that:
=CONCAT(RANDARRAY(LEN(Q12),1,1,9,TRUE))
and if you want the 0 s to be included then:
=RANDARRAY(1,1,1,9,TRUE) & CONCAT(RANDARRAY(LEN(Q12),1,0,9,TRUE))