R Venkat occasionally receives encrypted PDF files. Once the files are safely in his PC, they don’t need that protection. How does he remove it so he can more easily open the file?

There are times when a PDF truly needs encryption—for instance, if it contains sensitive information and someone just emailed it to you (let’s hope they used another communications method to send you the password). Once on your internal drive, this file should still be encrypted. But if you keep your sensitive files, or if you’ve, the file’s own built-in encryption is just an inconvenience. So here’s how to remove it. [Have a tech question?

Ask PCWorld Contributing Editor Lincoln Spector. Send your query to.] And no, I’m not about to tell you how to hack PDF encryption. I’m assuming here that you’re the legitimate recipient of the file, and that you already have the password.

(Besides, it's pretty much impossible with a strong password.) The simplest route requires a PDF printer driver. This is a program that appears to Windows as a print driver, but instead of sending data to a printer, it creates a PDF file.

Nov 04, 2016  FileOpen Plugin DRM for PDF circumvented. More information on my blog [Link deleted - MODERATOR] Last edited by Dr. Drib; at 08:25 AM., 09:44 AM #2: owl123. Join Date: Nov 2008. Device: Galaxy Note 3, Galaxy NotePro 12.2, InkBook. Finally I'll be able to *buy* and read some stuff.

Check your printer drivers—you may already have one installed. If not, there are plenty of free ones available. By the way, when you install BullZip, you’ll be asked to install three other programs.

These aren’t; they’re tools that BullZip actually needs to run properly. You’ll also need a PDF reader other than Adobe’s, which blocks this workaround. Load the file into Foxit Reader, entering the password when prompted. Then press Ctrl-p to print the file, and print it to your PDF “printer.” You’ll get an exact copy of the original, but without the encryption. You can also find cloud-based free tools, such as. But why run the risk of downloading the unencrypted version from a website if you don’t have to?

FileOpen are wankers Just for fun, here's what happened when I tried to view the DRM-protected PDF mentioned. So I pop the CD in my handy WinBox, navigate to the PDF file, and it opens Adobe Reader. Unfortunately no PDF appears. Instead I get the following ominous-looking message: Click the Yes button. It opens IE, not my default browser.

After a series of browser redirects that possibly starts at the Adobe site, it eventually settles down. Umm, exsqueeze me? Baking powder? A sphincter downloads what?

I don't care if they did manage to somehow get a redirect from Adobe, there's no way I'm downloading anything from some anonymous IP address and sticking it on my pristine computer. Onone perfect resize 7 5 crack keymaker x force 1. Even IE, bless it's heart, is warning me not to do it. So the point here is to ridicule the wankers from the corporation, who are apparently the authors of this plugin and the perpetrators of this nonsense. Thanks guys, and may the popups of a thousand different Spyware variants infest your WINDOWS/SYSTEM32 directories. (It should be pointed out that Sybex do provide an installer for the plugin on the CD.). As you note, the CD contains an installer.

That's the one you'd want to use, since only the Sybex installer will let you open the files on the Sybex CD. And only Adobe can explain why the Acrobat plug-in finder launched IE, rather than some other browser.

Obviously that isn't our doing (you didn't yet have any of our code on your machine). Our installers are signed with Authenticode, and the anonymous IP is only because we hadn't yet transfered the fileopen.com domain to that IP. We provide the ActiveX only as a convenience; nobody has to run it, and it doesn't do any spying. We have a message about that at Good luck with your blog, anyway.

So are you telling me that even if I do the unthinkable and download your plugin from some anonymous IP address it won't even work with the PDFs on the Sybex CD? Sheesh, do you guys like pissing off your users or what? Do you understand why I first opened the PDF in Acrobat instead of using the Sybex installer? It's because I (more or less) trust my copy of Acrobat more than I trust any software on the Sybex CD. Can I take it from your dog-ate-my-homework excuse that you accept that downloads from anonymous IP addresses are bad?

Looking at the screenshot above there is no way to tell whether I am downloading from the intended source or not, and hence the trustworthiness of the download is severely in question. The privacy message is meaningless - there is no way for me to associate that message with the software being downloaded. But I don't care about whether or not I can trust your software. It's the global effects that I'm worried about. When supposedly reputable companies start distributing their software in this way, and it becomes acceptable practice to download from anonymous IP addresses, it lowers the barrier to entry for all the malware authors trying to get their crap onto our desktops.