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Writer's pictureBarrett Newell

Service Provider Finishes "a Year and a Half's Work" in Weeks with Blackout

The Challenge


Leidos is known for embracing innovative technology to create more efficient processes for its clients. It holds numerous national security awards and a spot on the Top 100 Government Contractors list. However, manual redaction was a significant pain point for their team because of how much time it consumes – leading to higher end costs for its clients.

The inefficiency of manual redaction became an urgent concern when a case with a short time-frame for review arose. Names, dates of birth, phone numbers, addresses, Social Security numbers, and email addresses needed redaction across a considerably large document set. Additionally, names needed replacing with a unique identifier and Leidos only had a small team available to conduct this work.


The Solution​

Blackout allowed Leidos to redact specific information while pseudo-anonymizing names with unique identifiers. Its seamless integration with Relativity allowed for quick, painless deployment and a familiar user interface. (One user trained for just an hour, but required no additional support.)

Blackout reduced the workload through automating redactions, but also by eliminating work flow steps with intuitive UX/UI design. Instead of a page-by-page review, Blackout's mass redaction function shortened the project by more than a year, achieving Leidos's primary goal of meeting a tight client deadline.


The Outcomes

  • 800,000 redactions of PII made

  • Over 4,000 unique names redacted alongside additional secured PII

  • Approximately 500 unique identifiers applied to redacted data​

  • Deadline met in a matter of weeks (A manual process would have taken approx. 540 days.)​

  • End client reported immense satisfaction with reduced cost and expedited timeline


"We were able to apply 800,000 redactions in just two days – accomplishing nearly a year and a half’s work in a few weeks. If we had performed [a] manual review, the estimated time for redactions alone would have been 540 days."

Angela Green, Deputy Director at Leidos


 

Leidos is a Fortune 500® information technology, engineering, and science solutions and services leader working to solve the world’s toughest challenges in the defense, intelligence, homeland security, civil, and health markets. The company’s 32,000 employees support vital missions for government and commercial customers. Headquartered in Reston, Virginia, Leidos reported annual revenues of approximately $10.19 billion for the fiscal year ended December 28, 2018.

 

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