Encrypt PDF with certificate (alternative to Acrobat?)

Hi,
we need to encrypt PDF document with a certificate of our company.
We already worked with Acrobat's feature to do this, but we need to offer the possibility to encrypt documents to many of our employees.
But only for this reason we don't want to buy licenses of Acrobat, so do you no alternative software that provides this feature?

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Permissions with problem when encrypting pdf with certificate

I am using the following javascript code to encrypt a pdf using a certificate:
                    var thePermissions = {
                         allowAll: false,
                         allowAccessibility: false,
                         allowContentExtraction: false,
                         allowChanges: "none",
                         allowPrinting: "none"
                     var theCertificate = security.importFromFile(
                         "Certificate",
                         "/c/user.cer"
                     var theUserEntity = {
                         firstName: "The",
                         lastName: "User",
                         fullName: "The User",
                         certificates: theCertificate,
                         defaultEncryptCert: theCertificate
                     var theGroup = { userEntities: [ theUserEntity ], permissions: thePermissions };
                     encryptForRecipients( { oGroups: [ theGroup ] } );
                    saveAs("encrypted.pdf");
The file "encrypted.pdf" resulting is in fact encrypted, but the permissions doesn't seem to be correct. For instance, the Document Properties show that there are no document restrictions (DocumentProperties.PNG), but when the details are shown, it seems that the correct restrictions apply (DocumentSecurity.PNG). As can be seen in the permissions variable, there should be no permissions to the pdf generated. Can someone possibly help me with this?
Additional info: there should have no human interaction in the process, the certificate is not fixed (preventing using encryptUsingPolicy), and will be selected based on the file name of the original pdf.

Hi Leonard,
I see the same thing executing the script from the JavaScript console. There is a slight wrinkle in the steps to reproduce. Even if everything worked as it's supposed to, you would still need to close and then reopen the file in order to get the perm restrictions to take effect. This is because when you initially encrypt the file you are still the document owner, and thus none of the perms have yet taken effect. However, once you do close and then reopen the file (thus forcing an authentication), the file should open with the perms being enforced, but alas, they are not.
Interestingly, if you go into the Document Properties and then select the Security tab (or just click the Permissions Details button in the DMB) you see that the Restriction Summary shows that everything is allowed, but when you click the Show Details button, which just displays the restrictions applicable to the encryption handler, it shows the correct settings. Of course the real bug isn't that the restriction summary is incorrect, but rather that it is correct and all of the supposedly restricted operations are allowable.
I'll enter this as a bug against 10 along with the ER to add the encryption algorithm as an option to the encryptForRecipients JS function.
Steve

Why unable to sign PDF with certificate after applying Nitro PDF password protection? (despite it explicitly allowing signing with certificates)

I used Adobe Reader XI to sign PDFs with certificate, which worked perfectly. Except that the PDF could still be edited by other programs (for example, Nitro PDF) after the signing (but not the fill out fields and the signature). To apply password protection makes sense to avoid changes in the PDF being made after it has been signed. So I applied password protection via Nitro PDF that allows only enter fill-out fields and signing. But when I open it with Adobe Reader, the filling out works fine, but the signing part is not available to click on it (all of the buttons under "Sign" tab are grey). When I go on the Security properties with Adobe Reader, I can explicitly see that signing of this PDF is allowed and yet the option is not open to use for me anymore.
Any ideas on why it is the case and what I could do about that?
Many thanks!
O.

Actually yes, I just asked my colleague to assist me with this, he password-protected the PDF with Acrobat 8, explicitly allowing for signing and fill-out functions, it also appears in Adobe Reader under security properties as "allowed", but it is not open to use in the Reader for me anymore (grey buttons).

Encrypt pdf with trusted certificates on acrobat pro xi

Hi all,
I'm supporting a user who used to encrypt documents with trusted identities (*.fdf) on Acrobat X.
Now on Acrobat XI, when trying to encrypt a document, he can't used trusted identities. It seems like Acrobat XI only allow encryption from Digital ID (imported from *.pfx)
Is this correct? Any way we can encrypt on Acrobat XI with trusted identities?
Thanks.
Welly

Hi Welly,
A digital ID (a P12 or PFX file) consists of three parts; a Public-Key Certificate, the public key, and the private key. The Public-Key Certificate (PKC) is the textual portion that you see in a certificate viewer and contains stuff like the user's name (aka the Subject), the issuers name, validity dates, serial number. etc. The two keys (public and private) have a symbiotic relationship when what one key locks (encrypts) only the corresponding other key can unlock (decrypt). Either key can be used to lock (encrypt) data, but whichever is used the data has to be unlocked (decrypted) using the other key.
If the file doesn't contain the private key, but just has the PKC and the public key then that is known as a certificate file. Certificate files can be shared with the world, where as a digital ID file is only for use by one person. A certificate file can be view by anyone, but a digital ID file is either password or PIN protected.
That said, when it comes to encrypting a PDF file using Certificate Security the file is encrypted using one or more certificate files, and only the certificate file is used. However, during the encryption process Acrobat asks the user to select one of their own digital IDs to use in order to keep from locking them out of the file. In reality Acrobat only want access to the public-key portion of the file for the encryption process, but it asks the user to select their digital ID to start. You can elect not to use your own digital ID and skip to the portion where you select the public key certificate of the recipients, and if you know to do so you can select your own, but when it comes time to get back into the file you have to have the private key to decrypt the file and that means you have to have access to the digital ID file. It doesn't make a lot of sense that you would encrypt the file for yourself and not already have the digital ID loaded.
As far and certificate files go, they can be shared in either the FDF format, the CER file format, or the P7B file format. The format of the file is just the transport mechanism to distribute the public key.
Steve

Adobe open encrypted PDF with expired certificate

Hi,
I encrypt and sign documents with certificates. To do this I use a script and the little program "jsignpdf". The certificates are stored in windows certificate store on the client.This works fine!
The problem is that Adobe Reader (10/11) open the encrypted PDF also when the certificate is expired. I don't find any option to change that.
Has anbody an idea to solve my problem?
The clients have windows vista and Adobe Reader 10. But Adobe Reader11 have the same problem.
Thanks
Steven

If you are signing with Acrobat, you have the choice of whether to include revocation information. See Establish long-term signature validation in http://helpx.adobe.com/acrobat/using/validating-digital-signatures.html.

Unable to save a copy of encrypted pdf with Acrobat Pro 10.0

I create an encrypted pdf using prince a tool to convert HTML documents to pdf. I am unable to save a copy of the pdf file when i use Acrobat Pro 10.0.
It displays the following error
"The document could not be saved. There was a problem reading this document(21)."
However Acrobat Reader (basic) allows me to do so.
I am also able to save a copy of the document with Acrobat pro 7. I raised this issue with Prince and they told me that it could probably be a bug/unwanted behaviour with Acrobat Pro 10.0
My system environment details:
OS: Windows xp
Acrobat Pro: 10.0.0
Acrobat Reader: 10.1.0

Use the forum for Adobe Acrobat.

Unable to save a copy of encrypted pdf with Acrobat Pro

I create an encrypted pdf using princexml a tool to convert HTML documents to pdf. I am unable to save a copy of the pdf file when i use Acrobat Pro 10.0.
It displays the following error
"The document could not be saved. There was a problem reading this document(21)."
However Acrobat Reader (basic) allows me to do so. I am also able to save a copy of the document with Acrobat pro 7. I raised this issue with Prince and they told me that it could most probably be a bug/unwanted behaviour with Acrobat Pro 10.0
My system environment details:
OS: Windows xp
Acrobat Pro: 10.0.0
Acrobat Reader: 10.1.0

Use the forum for Adobe Acrobat.

Pdf with audio files embedded - Acrobat Pro 8 vs Acrobat Reader XI - suggestions?

Hi, I have a problem with a pdf (containing embedded audio files) created with Acrobat Pro 8.
So, two questions for you.
1) When I open it with Acrobat Reader XI, the audio files won't be reproduced.
Windows 7 and 8 tell me that there is a codec problem.
Finding the right codec seems to be very hard (looking on the previous threads in this forum I found some links to websites offering codec packs, but when you download them it seem they start offering many other things to download, and this stresses a lot).
Any other suggestions?
2) The other question is kind of reverse of the first one: if I create a pdf with Acrobat XI, will an Acrobat Reader 8 or 9 be able to open it and listend to the audio files???
Thank you,
aliB

Dear Pat,
I try to write it again.
Unfortunately installing Flash doesn't solve the problem on Windows 7 and 8 (on the XP it works).
Kind regards
Alessandra

Encrypting PDF with password. PDF command failed due to PDFlib error: Bad parameter.

I'm trying to encrypt a PDF with a password and receive this error.
~ERROR~com.adobe.document.PDFManipulation~: PDF command failed due to PDFlib error: Bad parameter.
It does not throw an exception, it just logs this error.
Anybody know how to fix this?
Version: 7.0.2
OS: Win

I was also getting this error, when trying to set usage rights on a document and then encrypt it with a password. I found a solution which works (more like a workaround, as this feels like a bug):
1. Open the unprotected file
2. Call pdfDocument.encryptWithPassword()
3. Call pdfDocument.save(), write resulting bytes to temp file
4. Reopen this file with pdfFactory.openPdfWithPassword()
5. Now you can call pdfDocument.setUsageRights() and pdfDocument.save()

How do I create the highest quality pdfs with InDesign CS5 and Acrobat Pro 9? New settings needed?

I sent a lot of jobs to printing companies by sending them high-res proofs on very large, multiple page jobs with lots of photos and graphics. Many companies are requesting that I just send pdfs. I just upgraded to Windows 7 and CS5. I used to have some special settings in my older Acrobat Distiller and InDesign which have been lost. They gave a much better result that what I seem to be getting from the "Press Quality" setting for pdf's. Does anyone have an excellent list of settings that can used to improve the quality of pdf's? I don't know if this is a combination of settings in both InDesign itself, as well as in Acrobat Distiller, or if the settings in one program will solve this. I have a job pending that needs improvement in the pdf quality. Thank you.

Thanks Peter. My last post was specific to using the Print Booklet feature (which is now solved thanks to your help). But this is related to creating high-res pdfs in general that go to printing companies, and being used for sending high-res proofs to clients. In general I don't need to set up printer spreads for my jobs (just for the one I asked about in my other post), but I used to have some specific settings that a printing company supplied me with to give the highest res pdf output possible. Those settings did in fact give a better result than the Press Quality settings built into my Adobe programs. I have had printers over the years request that I create a postscript file, then use distiller (using the settings they supplied) and I got an excellent result. After getting a new computer, Windows 7 and new CS5 and Acrobat Pro 9 upgrade, all of these settings were lost. I have notes on the settings from a couple of years ago, but they don't seem to apply to the CS5 programs in every given area and I feel like there may be just a couple of boxes that either should or shouldn't be checked that I'm missing now.
I understand that this is very specific information, and I may just need to go with the Press Quality settings. The printing company that gave me that great info a while back is no longer in business and other printing companies I have checked with won't spend that kind of time with me (or maybe they don't know anything other than using the Print Quality setting). Maybe within the CS5 program now, the quality of this setting has been improved more than I realize yet. Again, I'm new to CS5 and am just trying to get everything back to the way I used to have things running, and trying to get the best results possible.
Thanks again!

Signing pdf with certificate

I am using pdfwriter on Windows to sign my pdf's with a certificate. Does an equivalent exist for archlinux? My google-fu didn't turn up anything... Thanks!

It sounds like your problems stem from needing to adhere to whatever protocol pdfwriter uses. I'm not familiar with that piece of software myself.
Basically, you have three options in front of you: pdfwriter uses some open specification which *nix has already implemented under some other name; pdfwriter uses a closed specification which has been partially re-implemented in *nix so you can do basic stuff; pdfwriter uses a totally closed spec which no one else cares about.
If it's one of the first two, you'll be able to find a work around. If it's the last one, you should kick your employer right in the nuts.

Opening PDFs with Preview instead of Acrobat within Safari

I much prefer to use Preview for downloaded PDFs than have Acrobat open PDFs in Safari. How can I switch back to Preview once I have installed Acrobat 7?
Thanks inadvance!

PDF Browser Plug-in is a good alternative for viewing PDF files accessed via a web page. You can save or print from the pdf page. I've used it for a couple of years now, and IMO is a viable alternative to Preview, especially in quickly accessing the information within Safari.
There is no charge for the plug-in if used for non-commercial purposes.
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Opens pdf with windows media not acrobat reader

When I try to read PDF files, windows media opens not Acrobat reader, although I have checked acrobat reader to open these files.

fwiw - A combination of Acrobat / Adobe Reader that are not the same release is not recommended/supported by Adobe.
As long as you have to use Acrobat 9 it'd be best to stay with Adobe Reader 9.
Good to know is that the Acrobat 9.x product family passed into "End of Support" mid-year 2013 and is not compatible with contemporary OSs.
Be well...

Trouble opening LiveCycle DRM-encrypted PDFs in Adobe Acrobat v.10.0.2

LiveCycle DRM-encrypted PDFs open fine in Adobe Acrobat v. 9, v. 10.1.7, and v. 11. Why don't they open in v. 10.0.2? Is this a known problem? My company is UNABLE to upgrade or downgrade to another version of Adobe at this time, but we need to be able to open these PDFs with version 10.0.2. What is the solution? I get the following message when attempting to open these PDFs:

pharmalib wrote:
And, if there is a bug, is there any solution other than to upgrade to the next version?
Usually bugs are fixed in updated software versions; what kind of other solution do you expect?
Actually, looking at ftp://ftp.adobe.com/pub/adobe/reader/win/10.x/ I see that 10.0.2 has been removed completely, so this appears to have been an especially buggy version.

ICal and encrypt pdf

Hi there, is there anyone who knows how to encrypt a pdf from iCal ?
What I mean is when I try to print (pdf, encrypt pdf) with a calendar that have 2 or more pages the result is always the same: Error while printing.
I can save the document in pdf but I can't encrypt it.
Someone have a solution ?
Thanks!
Dan

For what it's worth, I get the same error. Perhaps a call to Apple 800-APL-CARE

Encrypt PDF with certificate (alternative to Acrobat?)

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