Data Mask

J

Jasmine

I have users entering a social security number into a specific cell on an
Excel worksheet. On the worksheet itself I don't want to see the number but
maybe # sign or something else to mask the field instead. Is there anyway to
do this in Excel? Thank you!
 
D

Dave F

There is, but it's not secure.

Excel is not a secure application and should not be used to store sensitive
information like SSN.

Dave
 
J

Jasmine

I'm not looking for something secure. My users have a form they fill out and
print. I just don't want the SSN to print out.
 
C

CLR

Like Dave says, Excel is not secure.....but to answer your question, you can
Custom format the cells for "#########" and it will show only the #########
in the cell but the formula bar will display the actual number. And, in
order for this to work, the SS number has to be entered without any dashes,
which turns it into TEXT and therefore will not format as desied. To this
end, you could set up DataValidation on those cells to be sure the user
enters a NUMBER instead of TEXT.

hth
Vaya con Dios,
Chuck, CABGx3
 
J

Jasmine

Thank you. That's what I needed.

CLR said:
Like Dave says, Excel is not secure.....but to answer your question, you can
Custom format the cells for "#########" and it will show only the #########
in the cell but the formula bar will display the actual number. And, in
order for this to work, the SS number has to be entered without any dashes,
which turns it into TEXT and therefore will not format as desied. To this
end, you could set up DataValidation on those cells to be sure the user
enters a NUMBER instead of TEXT.

hth
Vaya con Dios,
Chuck, CABGx3
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