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For patent and security issues I want to know if SolidWorks (relevant versions are 2012, 2015 and 2016) stores user, license and further metadata inside .sldprt, .sldasm and .slddrw files.

If so: Are there measures of evaluating the metadata and/or tampering it?

Is there a way to circumvent the delivery of metadata by e.g. exporting as STEP?

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  • $\begingroup$ I was curious if this applies to Matlab as well. $\endgroup$
    – MountainClimberi
    Commented Feb 14, 2017 at 15:33
  • $\begingroup$ I understand there may be security concerns, but could you clarify what patent concerns there would be? CAD files are never included with patents. $\endgroup$
    – Eric S
    Commented Feb 14, 2017 at 21:51
  • $\begingroup$ Difficult to explain without disclosing company internals. Let's say you have the license (paid or in exchange for other licenses) to use a foreign patent for your products. But only if they are really your products. You aren't allowed to sell products using the foreign patent if a third party other than your company produced them. If there is a lawsuit about a license agreement you will be audited using all CAD data. If there are signs of design work done outside your company without having a proper explanation this will be turned against you. $\endgroup$
    – Ariser
    Commented Feb 15, 2017 at 7:44

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You won't know for sure without contacting the developers directly but I've examined some .sldprt files with a HEX editor and there doesn't seem to important metadata. Unlike other files such as mp3 where the metadata is displayed in plain text at the top of the file, sldprt files seem only to contain a file declaration and data. However I would want to make sure if I were you as this sounds like it could be an important thing to know.

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