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8 BEST WAYS TO BEST WAYS TO
SECURE SECURE
YOUR YOUR PDF PDF
PDFs beat almost every other kind of
document when it comes to security.
But which methods are available, and which
ones should you integrate into your workflow?

TRUST MANAGER

Turn on TRUST MANAGER in your PDF
reader to guard against malware from
malicious PDF documents.

23% 23%
of annualized costs from
cybercrime were related
to malicious code(1)

REDACTION

PERMANENT REMOVAL
of visible text and
images. If you’ve ever
read a government
report, you’ve probably
seen redaction in
practice.

COMMON INFORMATION
SUBJECT TO REDACTION:

Social Security
Numbers
Dates
of birth
Home
Addresses
Medical
Information
Financial
account
numbers
Insurance
coverage
details
740 740
million+ million+
Online records
exposed in 2013(2)

ENCRYPTION

Two main types of
encryption, PASSWORD
and DIGITAL , can help
secure your PDFs.
PASSWORD:
Access available
via password only
DIGITAL:
Access determined
by digital certificates
Encryption using
passwords is by far the
MOST COMMON
though it is generally
less secure than digital
certificates.
More than 1
MILLION
people
per day SUSTAIN
CYBERATTACKS.
That’s
14 ADULTS 14 ADULTS
EVERY SECOND.(3) EVERY SECOND.(3)

DIGITAL SIGNATURE

Verifies the authenticity of the
signee and the integrity of the
signed document.
1 IDENTITY
THIEF
THIEF
WAS CONVICTED
FOR EVERY
20,750
INTERNET CRIME
VICTIMS (4)

DOCUMENT CERTIFICATION

Enables CONTROL OF APPROVED
DOCUMENTS
, ensuring that certain changes
will not be possible for the document to
remain certified. For instance, if your marketing
manager has signed off on the next quarter’s
plan, you wouldn’t want someone changing a
budget item, so document certification
controls what types of changes can be made.
$5.9 $5.9
billion billion
Global losses in
2013 due to
phishing alone(5)

RIGHTS MANAGEMENT

CYBERCRIME
costs the global
economy about
$445
$445
billion
billion
per year (6)
Two main types of rights management, information rights management
and digital rights management, can help keep your documents secure.
INFORMATION RIGHTS MANAGEMENT (IRM):
Typically within a company, this includes giving
individuals specific rights, which can differ
depending on the person.
DIGITAL RIGHTS MANAGEMENT (DRM):
Protects information after sale, most often
consumer-facing, the biggest contemporary
example of DRM in practice are paywalls.

DOCUMENT SANITIZATION

This allows you to remove sensitive information from
your document before publishing.

COMMON ITEMS REMOVED
IN SANITIZATION:
Metadata Comments Hidden
layers
Overlapping
Objects
Hidden data from
previous versions
4040
millionmillion
Americans who have had
personal information
stolen by hackers(6)

That’s about
15% 15%
OF THE
POPULATION.(6)
=1 million

WATERMARKS, HEADERS, FOOTERS

Watermarks, headers and footers
all indicate the LEVEL OF
CONFIDENTIALITY
a document
should have. However, this
method depends on people
enforcing the security, as there’s
no mechanism inside the
document to prevent those who
shouldn’t see it from being able
to view it.
1 in 14 1 in 14
PROGRAMSPROGRAMS
is later confirmed as malware.(7)