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MS Edge PDF Viewer not respecting PDF document security settings

Anonymous
2024-10-16T19:35:16+00:00

I've created a PDF that's as locked down as I can make it. Printing is allowed, as is "Content Copying for Accessibility", but that is it - no changing, assembly, content copying, page extraction, commenting, filling of form fields, signing, or creation of template pages.

I have it set back to Acrobat v7.0 and later for maximum compatibility, which according to Adobe, shouldn't cause any security issues.

When I open it in MS Edge (v 129.0.2792.65) on my Mac (Sonoma 14.5), the built-in PDF viewer allows text, highlights, pen drawing, etc. Theoretically that would be OK for people to do whatever they want to do on their own screen. But if they print or download it, it shows all annotations including text. (Once downloaded to my desktop, it still shows as a secured document within Acrobat.)

There is a little message in the viewer that shows "This file has limited permissions. You may not have access to some features." When I click on "View permissions", it shows the correct security settings on the document.

Is there something super obvious that I'm missing about how this could possibly be allowed to happen?

Thanks,

Scott

P.S. Our website is just doing an iFrame to view this file, can't imagine that would break security, but just wanted to throw this out there.

P.P.S. I've tried to upload a screenshot as both a PNG and a JPEG, and both have failed. If it's helpful, I'll upload and create a link.

Microsoft Edge | Read PDFs | Android

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  1. Anonymous
    2024-10-17T07:47:13+00:00

    Hello, Scott Harvey

    Welcome to the Microsoft Community.

    Hello, thank you for your feedback on your issue here, it sounds like you've done a lot of work to protect your PDFs, but the issues you're experiencing when using Microsoft Edge's PDF viewer are really confusing.

    Since I can't test with the same file as you, but I can first analyze some possible underlying causes for you, here are some things to consider:

    1.Edge's PDF viewer limitations: Microsoft Edge's built-in PDF viewer may not be able to fully adapt adobeacrobat in the application of all the security settings, especially in the annotation and editing features. This could explain why users can add annotations that are then visible when printing or downloading.

    This can be tested by looking at other browsers.

    1. Compatibility settings: While setting PDF to be compatible with acrobatv7.0 and later should generally ensure broad compatibility, Edge's PDF viewer may interpret these settings differently. It may be necessary to test with the latest compatibility settings to see if this changes the behavior.
    2. iFrame Viewing: Embedding a PDF in a website's iFrame will not, in itself, break security settings, but it may affect how the PDF is rendered and interacted with in the browser. Testing the PDF outside of the iFrame may help isolate the problem.

    Or see if other pdfs that can be opened make any difference.

    1. Edge Settings: Check the PDF settings in the edge. Navigate to edge://settings/content/pdfDocuments and make sure the “Always open PDF files externally” option is turned off. This setting may affect the way PDFs are handled in the browser!

    Also, if you can provide a link to the screenshot, you can synchronize the cloud link for sharing such as onedrive. this may help to further diagnose the problem.

    Best regards

    Bobhe | Microsoft Community Support Specialist

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  2. Anonymous
    2024-10-17T18:44:37+00:00

    Hi Bob - appreciate you taking the time to reply. Yes, I thought I mentioned but maybe I didn't - no other browser has the same problem, only Edge.

    Different PDF compatibility settings didn't change it, and since we can't police the individual settings of our website visitors, #4 isn't an option.

    Amazingly, it is the iFrame that broke the security. I considered that early on and dismissed it out of hand because it makes no sense.

    So now I either need to use an external viewer/plug-in/embedder, or have a clunky link to allow people to open it outside of an iFrame. Or a redirect to the PDF itself from our "clean" URL, which is also clunky.

    Anyway, thanks very much for helping me figure out what the problem was (I should have checked myself, sorry), but I'm still blown away that the Edge browser has this issue.

    Since you asked, here's a link to a screenshot of the annotations and text tool working, on a clearly secured document, by the way.

    Thanks.

    Scott

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