word document is not 100% protected

[netbroker]

I just had to prepare and send a ‘client visiting form’ to a client to sign,
normally I would convert into an Acrobat pdf. document for security.

I was not able to do so because of a software problem, so I sent out the
word doc. protected. Just checking and playing with the document before
sending out I noticed that indeed it was security proof because anyone wanted
to make any changes whilst the document is protected will come up with a lot
of crossed out red ink.
Fine. But if some one just ‘Selects All’ and copies to a new page then
surely the whole object of the exercise to protect a document, for it not to
be tampered with is valid useless. Can you explain to me then the point of
protecting a document, if it is not 100% protection?

 

[CyberTaz]

Protection merely prevents the *original* file from being modified. There is
no such thing as "100% protection" - if you put it out there it can be
replicated & the replica can be edited.

 

[Graham Mayor]

And that applies equally to PDF!

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Graham Mayor - Word MVP


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[netbroker]

Thanks CyberTaz for your response.

Fine, but don't you think that the engineers in Microsoft and all the MVP
people should put their thinking hats on.

My suggestion that once a word document is protected then it should be 100%,
by disenabling the select and copy function, this way it can never be
tampered with as the original document.

Ok , If someone really wanted to copy and tamper an original he would have
to start fron scratch to edit another document, this of course could loose
some of the authenticity.

 

[Graham Mayor]

*ANYTHING* that you allow someone to see or hear can be duplicated. It's a
simple fact of life. If you could think of a way of preventing it, the media
industries alone would reward you far beyond your wildest dreams - but it
simply isn't possible.
Disabling the select and copy functions will not achieve the required ends.
If you use a suitably strong password it will be difficult to make changes
to the original document, but a duplicate that could even fool you would not
be too hard to produce.

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Graham Mayor - Word MVP


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[CyberTaz]

.... And even if you could prevent copying you couldn't prevent printing
hardcopy or screen captures which could then be OCRed and edited. Besides,
if someone finds a way to do what you want, that automatically provides the
ability to reverse it.

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac