Philter
philterd.ai
What it is
Philter is open-source software for finding and redacting personally identifiable information and protected health information in text. For detected entities, users can choose to mask, encrypt, replace with synthetic values, remove, or pass them through. Policies, custom dictionaries, and identifier patterns such as medical record numbers and transaction IDs let teams configure what to detect and how to handle it. General Purpose, Healthcare, and COVID-19 NLP lenses address different types of text. Philter provides an HTTP REST API, a Java SDK, and an OpenAPI specification for generating clients in other languages. It can run in a private environment or through AWS, Google Cloud, and Microsoft Azure marketplaces. The maker says text stays in the customer’s environment, including firewalled or air-gapped deployments. Redaction requests are recorded in a tamper-evident, hash-chained audit log that can be queried and exported to CSV. Detection is probabilistic, so results should be checked against an organization’s own data before production use. The open-source toolkit has community support; commercial licenses include direct support.
Spec sheet
- What it does
- Philter is open source software that redacts personally identifiable and protected health information from text.Read 2 Oct 2026 · philterd.ai
- Intended users
- The maker describes Philter for healthcare, finance, legal, government, and AI workloads, including teams adding redaction to APIs and data pipelines.Read 2 Oct 2026 · philterd.ai
- Support
- The open source toolkit includes community support through documentation and GitHub issue trackers, while commercial licenses include direct support.Read 2 Oct 2026 · philterd.ai
- Founded
- 2017Read 23 Sep 2026 · philterd.ai
- Accuracy limitation
- Detection is probabilistic, and the maker advises validating results against a customer’s own data before relying on them in production.Read 2 Oct 2026 · philterd.ai
- API and SDKs
- Philter provides an HTTP REST API, a Java SDK, and an OpenAPI specification for generating clients in other languages.Read 2 Oct 2026 · philterd.ai
- Audit trail
- Philter records redaction requests in a tamper-evident, hash-chained audit log in the customer’s datastore, which can be queried and exported to CSV.Read 2 Oct 2026 · philterd.ai
- Cloud deployment
- Philter can be deployed in a private environment or through AWS, Google Cloud, and Microsoft Azure marketplaces.Read 2 Oct 2026 · philterd.ai
- Company history
- Philterd says it was founded in 2017 by Jeff Zemerick.Read 2 Oct 2026 · philterd.ai
- Data handling
- The maker says Philter runs in the customer’s environment and does not transmit text to third-party services; it can run in a firewalled or air-gapped environment.Read 2 Oct 2026 · philterd.ai
- Detection and actions
- It detects many entity types and lets users choose to mask, encrypt, replace with synthetic values, drop, or pass them through.Read 2 Oct 2026 · philterd.ai
- Models
- Philter offers General Purpose, Healthcare, and COVID-19 NLP lenses for different text types.Read 2 Oct 2026 · philterd.ai
- Open source and security
- The maker says its products are released under Apache 2.0, with source code publicly available on GitHub for inspection and self-building.Read 2 Oct 2026 · philterd.ai
- Policies and custom entities
- Users can define policies, custom dictionaries, and identifier patterns such as medical record numbers and transaction IDs.Read 2 Oct 2026 · philterd.ai
Plans and prices
Open source toolkit Free Self-hosted · Apache 2.0 · No license keys · No usage caps · No commercial review Read 2 Oct 2026 · philterd.ai
Philter Desktop — Personal & evaluation Free Individual, non-commercial, and evaluation use · Full on-device redaction · Community support on GitHub Read 2 Oct 2026 · philterd.ai
Philter Desktop — Commercial $100 a year $100 USD per user / year Per user · Commercial use · Direct creator support · Updates, maintenance releases, and upgrades during subscription Read 2 Oct 2026 · philterd.ai
Strong points and limits
Strong points
- Multiple actions for detected entities
- Custom policies, dictionaries, and identifier patterns
- REST API, Java SDK, and OpenAPI specification
- Audit log can be queried and exported
- Can run in firewalled or air-gapped environments
Limits
- Detection is probabilistic
- Results should be validated against customer data
- Commercial desktop use costs $100 a year per user
Who it suits
Philter suits teams in healthcare, finance, legal, government, or AI workloads that need configurable text redaction in APIs or data pipelines. It also fits organizations seeking a customer-controlled or air-gapped deployment.
Verdict
Philter offers configurable redaction and customer-controlled deployment, with an audit trail and API options. Its probabilistic detection makes validation against your own data an important step before production use.
Where Specifiction places it
- Document Redaction Software#8 of 278.2
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