Printing encrypted PDFs
March 16, 2005 3:49 AM Subscribe
I have a PDF file that doesn't want to print. The print commands are grayed out in Acrobat Reader. The lock symbol appears indicating that the document is encrypted to prevent modification of "certain aspects". However, I have other documents which appear to have similar encryption that print fine. Is the encryption causing this problem? If not, then what is? How can I work round the problem?
Best answer: Digital Rights Management (or DRM) is a term for systems designed to give content distributors control over your appliances, usually against your wishes and to your detriment. This is what you are up against.
In the USA, your rights (as an end-user) under copyright law become irrelevant if you use a DRM (ie crippled) system, because DRM allows distributors to put in place restrictions beyond those allowable by copyright law, yet under the DMCA (a law quite literally writen by a lobby group and rubberstamped by congress), it is illegal to circumvent DRM even if circumvention is necessary to perform a legal action. Hence you can no-longer take that legal action without breaking the law, hence the distributor can now define at whim what is legal for you to do and if that overrides your rights, tough. Such as "It is illegal for you to tell others about a bug in our software that allows their credit card details to be stolen at whim, because explaining the bug constitutes a circumvention of our 'locks' under the DMCA".
The purpose of DRM (and the DMCA that effectively gives it free reign to ride roughshod over the checks and balances of copyright law) is ostensibly to help in the fight against piracy, unfortunately it is far more reaching than is that.
In your case, the greyed out print option presumably means that the distributor of the document does not want people to be able to print it, and therefore, if you live in the USA, it is illegal for you to find a way to print it.
If you found a way to print it, this constitutes breaking that "lock", which is a felony. (Legally speaking, the lock need not be strong - imagine a door with not a padlock, but a hair held across the gap with spit - the point is that opening the door removes the hair, and removing the hair is illegal - even if you own the door but it's someone else's hair.)
The solution is to avoid crippled software and appliances. DRM has a long track record of making products bomb in the marketplace because consumers just don't want crippled goods that work against them. Keep that legacy going. Don't use crippled products that are loyal to someone else instead of you, and support organisations fighting these bad laws.
posted by -harlequin- at 4:41 AM on March 16, 2005
In the USA, your rights (as an end-user) under copyright law become irrelevant if you use a DRM (ie crippled) system, because DRM allows distributors to put in place restrictions beyond those allowable by copyright law, yet under the DMCA (a law quite literally writen by a lobby group and rubberstamped by congress), it is illegal to circumvent DRM even if circumvention is necessary to perform a legal action. Hence you can no-longer take that legal action without breaking the law, hence the distributor can now define at whim what is legal for you to do and if that overrides your rights, tough. Such as "It is illegal for you to tell others about a bug in our software that allows their credit card details to be stolen at whim, because explaining the bug constitutes a circumvention of our 'locks' under the DMCA".
The purpose of DRM (and the DMCA that effectively gives it free reign to ride roughshod over the checks and balances of copyright law) is ostensibly to help in the fight against piracy, unfortunately it is far more reaching than is that.
In your case, the greyed out print option presumably means that the distributor of the document does not want people to be able to print it, and therefore, if you live in the USA, it is illegal for you to find a way to print it.
If you found a way to print it, this constitutes breaking that "lock", which is a felony. (Legally speaking, the lock need not be strong - imagine a door with not a padlock, but a hair held across the gap with spit - the point is that opening the door removes the hair, and removing the hair is illegal - even if you own the door but it's someone else's hair.)
The solution is to avoid crippled software and appliances. DRM has a long track record of making products bomb in the marketplace because consumers just don't want crippled goods that work against them. Keep that legacy going. Don't use crippled products that are loyal to someone else instead of you, and support organisations fighting these bad laws.
posted by -harlequin- at 4:41 AM on March 16, 2005
Incidentally, it is also illegal (a felony I think) under the DMCA to tell someone how to circumvent a digital "lock".
Therefore, if anyone answers your question here, they can be thrown in jail for doing so, if they are in (or come to) the USA. (The DMCA seems a wee bit excessive to me :-)
posted by -harlequin- at 4:56 AM on March 16, 2005
Therefore, if anyone answers your question here, they can be thrown in jail for doing so, if they are in (or come to) the USA. (The DMCA seems a wee bit excessive to me :-)
posted by -harlequin- at 4:56 AM on March 16, 2005
Well, there's a whole history with Adobe and a company called Elcomsoft, dealing with this very issue.
Here's the end result. Of course you should only use this on files that you yourself created, never on someone else's file.
posted by jeremias at 5:11 AM on March 16, 2005
Here's the end result. Of course you should only use this on files that you yourself created, never on someone else's file.
posted by jeremias at 5:11 AM on March 16, 2005
I'm pretty sure the PDF-creation utilities in OpenOffice don't respect any kind of copyright tag DRM bullshit. Give their suite a shot if the other solutions don't work. You should be able to import the PDF and print it without trouble. If you want me to take a crack at it, my email is in my profile.
I say, circumvent DRM to your heart's desire. Nevermind the heavy-handed posters who need to pontificate.
posted by fake at 5:41 AM on March 16, 2005
I say, circumvent DRM to your heart's desire. Nevermind the heavy-handed posters who need to pontificate.
posted by fake at 5:41 AM on March 16, 2005
You can unlock features which the originator has turned off - you may need the proper password, however. You can see what has been locked by going to File->Document Properties->Security. Clicking on 'Change Settings' will allow you to do just that, if you know the password. If the originator of the document has forgotten the password, there are utilities which will help, such as PDF Password Recovery.
posted by skwm at 6:00 AM on March 16, 2005
posted by skwm at 6:00 AM on March 16, 2005
I'd recommend the best option to stop this happening again is to complain to the person/company/whatever you got it from. Unless it's trade secrets or soemthing I can't see a vaild reason for them to not what you printing it.
posted by cillit bang at 7:48 AM on March 16, 2005
posted by cillit bang at 7:48 AM on March 16, 2005
Yeah, seriously. Bitch out the person that gave the file to you. The problem is more about a crazy user than DRM.
posted by pwb503 at 8:16 AM on March 16, 2005
posted by pwb503 at 8:16 AM on March 16, 2005
If you're really in a bind, or say you don't know the creator, couldn't you take a screenshot of the PDF and then print that? Would that be illegal?
And yeah, the quality wouldn't be presentation-worthy, but it's something. Eh?
posted by hellbient at 9:01 AM on March 16, 2005
And yeah, the quality wouldn't be presentation-worthy, but it's something. Eh?
posted by hellbient at 9:01 AM on March 16, 2005
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by winston at 4:14 AM on March 16, 2005