my $file1 = "C:\\temp\\file1.txt"; my $file2 = "C:\\temp\\file2.bat"; open (FILE1,"$file"); open (FILE2,"$file2"); my @file1 = ; my @file2 = ; close (FILE1); foreach my $search_string (@file1) { if (grep /$search_string/,@file2) { while () { s/$search_string/"******"/g; print FILE2; } } } close (FILE2);