Amid huge row over the recently released batch of documents from US Department of Justice’s extensive Jeffrey Epstein files, a new report by The New York Times has revealed that some of the redacted material in the documents can easily be recovered. More than 11,000 files, totalling nearly 30,000 pages of photos, court records, FBI and DOJ documents, emails, news clippings, videos and other records related to Epstein were released on Monday, in the latest batch of documents related to the investigation of late financier and convicted sex offender.
Which parts of the documents were redacted?
Redactions were applied to several broad categories of information rather than to specific allegations or graphic details. Courts and the US Department of Justice have said the redactions were mainly intended to balance public transparency with legal and privacy protections.
Information about alleged victims and survivors, including their names or any other identifiable information, such as their phone numbers and email addresses have been redacted.
Some names were redacted because the individuals were not charged with crimes or were mentioned only in passing. Judges have said releasing these names without clear evidence could unfairly damage reputations.
How can one access the redacted material?
According to NYT, much of the information was not properly redacted digitally and some censored information could easily revealed by copying and pasting blacked-out text into a separate file.
One such failed redaction occurred in a civil suit against the executors of Epstein’s estate, filed in the Virgin Islands in 2021, NYT reported.
According to the redacted portion of the civil suit, revealed through copying and pasting into another document, one of the executors, Darren K Indyke, signed a cheque from Epstein’s foundation to an immigration lawyer who was “involved in one or more forced marriages arranged among Epstein’s victims.”
Further, videos of people successfully copy pasting redacted material onto a separate file also surfaced online.
Users on TikTok realizing they can just copy and paste the "redacted" text from Epstein file PDFs to read what it says pic.twitter.com/eboS6kOsqE
— Mike Rundle (@flyosity) December 23, 2025
Epstein files failed redaction: What have officials said about this?
A spokesman for the Justice Department declined to comment on the matter. President Trump last month signed into law a bill promising the release of all files related to the Epstein investigation, as well as transparency around their release. The bill said that no documents could be redacted on the basis of “embarrassment, reputational harm, or political sensitivity”.
“The only redactions being applied to the documents are those required by law, full stop,” Todd Blanche, the deputy attorney general, had said in a statement last week.
