Digital Rights Management for PDF Files & Documents – PDF DRM
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- Stop unauthorized access
- Stop sharing and distribution
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Not all PDF DRM software is secure
- PDF DRM systems that use passwords are not secure – users can share passwords and/or easily remove them with password ‘recovery’ software
- Adobe PDF permissions (stop copy, print etc.) can be removed without using any tools
- PDF DRM systems using plugins can be bypassed or stop working when updates occur
- PDF DRM systems that use JavaScript can put end users systems at risk of attack
“Truth be told, the single most compelling advantage of Locklizard to us is the mind-blowing nimbleness of your PDF DRM solution with virtual students.
We can cut accounts for a user five minutes before his class starts and voilà, he is ready to go. Happy smiling customer, while we still have security and personalized watermarking.
That is a big win over here at Qlik and has been very well received.”
Adding DRM to PDFs with Safeguard PDF DRM Security: control PDF access & use
How to add DRM to a PDF file using Safeguard PDF DRM
Adding DRM to PDF files with Safeguard is more secure than Adobe password security and simple.
Right-click on your PDFs in Windows File Explorer and select the menu option ‘Make Secure PDF’.
Protect a PDF with DRM controls
In Safeguard Secure PDF Writer, choose the PDF DRM controls:
- Stop printing, allow printing or limit the number of prints.
- Add dynamic watermarks to viewed and or printed pages. Dynamic variables replace actual user and system data when the document is viewed/printed so you only have to protect the document once for all users.
- Add expiry – make the PDF expire on a specific date, after a number of views, after a number of prints, or after a number of days from opening.
- Allow or stop screen grabbing (even from remote connections) applications and prevent use of Windows print screen.
- Log document views and prints.
- Give access to all authorized users, specific users, or those with access to publications (e.g. a training course).
- Limit use to country and IP locations (e.g. use only at work).
Safeguard’s default PDF DRM protection
- Stops users editing, copying and pasting content
- Locks PDF files to specific devices so they cannot be shared with others
- There are no passwords for users to enter, manage, or remove
- You can revoke PDFs at any time regardless of where they reside
Beginners guide to PDF digital rights management
What is PDF Digital Rights Management (PDF DRM)?
Although Adobe might like the mantle of having invented digital rights management for documents, there is no effective evidence to support that suggestion. However, it would be correct to point out that that the general adoption of the PDF format as a common presentation across multiple platforms has catapulted the Adobe approach to controls being those that are generally accepted as the default situation.
So what are these ‘default’ controls?
Well, the initial controls were:
- no printing
- changing the document
- copying or extraction, Disable accessibility
- no adding or changing comments or form fields.
These were later augmented to:
- printing – fully allowed, low resolution, not allowed
- allow content copying and extraction
- enable content access for the visually impaired
- allow only document assembly *
- allow only form field filling or signing *
- comment authoring field fill-in or signing *
- general editing, form field fill-in or signing *.
* these choices are mutually exclusive.
And then refined into:
- printing
- changing the document
- document assembly
- content copying or extraction
- content extraction for accessibility
- commenting
- filling of form fields
- signing
- creation of template pages.
And one must not forget the control of watermarking, either on-screen or on printed output, or both.
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PDF Rights Management document controls
PDF rights management software should contain the following controls for it to be effective at controlling document access and use.
PDF rights management & DRM controls
So, a great many of what are considered to be DRM controls may be seen as PDF digital rights management because they are the controls that Adobe found appropriate to provide when they developed their own approach to portable document management over a great many years. It has to be said that these may not reflect the same type of document rights as are envisaged by groups such as XrML, but the Adobe ones have been implemented on a global scale, and have stuck, which is more than can be said for the rest.
The core DRM functions in PDF digital rights management are printing, copying/extraction and changing with save. This is because it doesn’t matter what kind of publisher you are and what you are trying to achieve, you are going to need these functions whilst the work remains in Copyright.
Watermarking as a PDF DRM technique is, to be strict, a bit of an open question. On the one hand, many publishers wish to be able to allow their customers to make printed copies of information, but on the other they recognize that converting a good printed copy of a book into (say) a PDF format is trivial. But putting a heavy watermark on a document detracts from the visual quality of the result, and a light mark may be removed by adjusting scanning contrast. The same goes for attempts to watermark pictures. Some systems even try to put watermarks in that ‘identify’ the purchaser, to help prevent purchased copies from wandering. The jury remains out as to the actual value of watermarks in DRM, but they seem here to stay in the video and broadcast businesses, at least.
The PDF digital rights management of assembly, filling in forms, comment authoring, signing and templates are particular to facilities that Adobe specifically included in their products which are focused around document collaboration. Most of these are not likely to find their way into commercial publishing initiatives, although they may be appropriate in the elearning or education at a distance markets.
Finally we consider controls over document accessibility. This may well be one of the most vexed of the Adobe proposed PDF Digital Rights Management controls. Some cite Adobe Systems’ release in 2000 of a public domain work, Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland, with DRM controls asserting that “this book cannot be read aloud” and so disabling use of the text-to-speech feature normally available in Adobe’s eBook Reader as a perfect example of DRM overreach. Certainly, if a person with poor sight purchases a document that can be ‘spoken’ from the word text, is it right to prevent them from being able to use the document in that way? I don’t know any safe way to turn the famous Tenniel illustrations into words, but that would not stop plenty of Jabberwockies from having a damn good try. Given the stance of many governments, led by the European Union and Canada, into providing accessibility, artificial restrictions on accessibility may prove politically unsound.
So there you have it. PDF digital rights management controls represent a well thought out series of controls. We can argue about whether they are complete, appropriate or suitable. But they represent a significant stake in the ground about the controls that should be applied. In analysis, you can break PDF DRM controls down into three groups:
- those for pure publishers
- extensions for additional control
- those for document collaboration
Sometimes these distinctions may blur, but they have stood the test of time as being useful.
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Are PDF Digital Rights Management controls effective? |
It is important to understand the difference between providing PDF rights management controls and them being effective.
In many instances proposed PDF rights management controls have been so poorly implemented (see PDF password protection) that you have been able to drive the proverbial coach and horses through them. Indeed there are some web sites who offer tools dedicated to the cracking of much of the Adobe implementation. Not suprisingly, third party vendors have moved to providing implementations and controls that are less open to many of the attacks that have been popularized by such companies as Elcomsoft.
Some PDF Security vendors have gone down the route of PDF plugins but these can be overriden by other plugins and often fail to operate when Adobe Acrobat is updated. See PDF Security Issues, Flaws and Cracks for articles relating to these attacks.
Other companies such as Locklizard have produced dedicated secure PDF Viewers so that they are not exposed to vulnerabilities in other applications, ensuring that DRM controls can be effectively enforced.
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Safeguard PDF Security and Enterprise PDF Security ensure complete PDF DRM security with digital rights management controls. Document rights management to secure PDF documents and files without compromize.
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