Obfuscate tool is not a secure way to hide sensitive information and should be removed
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David@RD June 19, 2024 at 11:56 AMEdited
(even if it is an old topic)
I really like obfuscate tool and removing it will be for me a sad new.
In my user case, this help to give focus on a part of a screenshot without completly losting the context (compared with a crop)
Obfuscate tool help me to quick blur foreground and/or backgroud. So the focus of my interlocutor will be on the right par of the screenshot and he will still have a good overall comprehension of the scene
Jens Frandsen April 15, 2022 at 2:46 AM
Current obfuscate tool is quite weak. I pasted some obfuscated text into slack - and the thumbnail (shrunken text) was readable again.
However, I find the tool nice - I’d prefer a stronger obfuscate tool than an ugly as black-out.
Also - black out you can just use the rectangle tool.
Mischl July 29, 2021 at 11:11 AM
Black out tool possiblity:
Machine learning and brute force techniques can be used to identify information in blurred images. Images blurred using the obfuscate tool in Greenshot are vulnerable to these types of techniques and should not be used for hiding sensitive information if the user truly wants it to be protected. The average person is most likely not aware that these vulnerabilities exist and will choose to use the obfuscate tool thinking that it is secure. I know I wasn't aware of this until I recently stumbled upon the literature I linked above.
I recommend that the obfuscate tool is removed all together or replaced with a tool that simply colors over the image using a black box (or any color the user wants) which is the safest way to hide sensitive information. If there is a strong sentiment to keep the obfuscate tool the way that it is currently, then at the very least I recommend that a warning message be included somewhere in the user interface to let the user know the obfuscate tool is not a secure way of hiding sensitive information.