Fast Censor

fast_censor

• A fast and flexible package for filtering out profanity or other strings from text, ~100 times faster than alternatives
• the fastest string utility for profanity detection / censoring
• Allows for detection with repeated characters and character substitution
• Requires zero dependencies and works for python 3.6 -- 3.11

Installation

From source

cd fast-censor  # enter into project directory
python setup.py install 

From GitHub

pip install git+https://github.com/mbuchove/fast_censor.git

Uses

from fast_censor import FastCensor

# to load default (encoded) profanity word list
censor = FastCensor()

# load alternate path, example is a plain text word list without encoding
censor_clean = fast_censor.FastCensor(
    wordlist=fast_censor.WordListHandler.get_default_wordlist_path("clean_wordlist_decoded.txt"), 
    wordlist_encoded=False,
)

# censor texts or simply get the indices of matches
matches = censor_clean.check_text("this bat is for riii1ick")
# >>> [(5, 9), (17, 25)]
censored_text = censor_clean.censor("fuuudge you")
# >>> "******* you"

Character substitutions

FastCensor's profanity matcher allows the flexibility to match words when specified characters are substituted for others, as is customary in 1337 speak. A default is set for commonly used substitutions.

To set your own, for example, you would pass the following into FastCensor

substitutions = {'a': '@4'}

• all matching is case-insensitive

Character repititon

By default, words will still match even if a matching character is repeated any number of times. This includes any valid substitute for that character

For example, "baaa@@aatt" will match "bat"

You can turn this off by passing allow_repititions=False to censor_text or check_text

Delimiters

Use the delimiters parameter of FastCensor to set the delimiter characters, which determine the boundaries of a word. Profanity matches will not extend across any delimiting character.

For example, if '_' is a delimiter, "ba_t" would not match "bat"

Editing and saving wordlist

censor.add_word('new_word') # to add a new word censor.write_words_file("word_lists/new_wordlist_encoded.txt", encode=True)

Encoding

By default, the word lists are base64-encoded, so you can avoid displaying vulgar or offensive words. If you would like to save a word list in plain text, set encode=False in write_words_file

Benchmarks

See notebooks/benchmarks.ipynb for details

See: This Gist