WORD - Passworded and Encrypted - get errors??

[Encrypted Word Doc.]

Hi,

I have never passworded a Word document and encrypted it.
Does encrypting a document and then reopening them occasionally have errors???
I know errors happen as I have tested out encrypting files before.

Is the "weak encryption XOR" safe to use 100% of the time ?? Are the other
methods ok also???

Thanks

 

[Tony Jollans]

You have never passworded a Word document ... but you have tested encrypting
files before?

I have never heard of the encryption process damaging a file in any way. If
you have specific details, I would be interested in them.

Weak Encryption (XOR) is, as it says, weak, and most experts would not even
call it encryption at all; it is not, in any way, safe to use. Some
encryption of Word 97-2003 format files is OK for casual use, although there
are flaws in the process and modern computers can break it if you use the
default settings - you also need to be especially careful encrypting Word
97-2003 format binary files in Word 2007 or you can find previous encryption
weakened. Encryption of Word 2007-format documents in Word 2007 is fairly
good, and is what I would recommend if you need to encrypt a document - but
don't forget your password!

 

[Encrypted Word Doc.]

To Tony,

Yes i have tried encrypting text,doc and exe files and i found that after i
unencrypted them,the contents of files were scrambled and the exe files would
not work etc but did not happen in every case but in many instances.
I encryped individual files and also folders.
I used steganos and other software that i do not remember the name of.
From the advertising though it looked like encryption was common among
business users?? So you are saying that is not usual for errors to occur ???
And that it is a reliable form security ?? Ok .... but what was the problem
with my files ??? I followed the instructions for encryption/unencryption ...
This was a few years ago though....was there a change and improvement in the
software and encryption formats??

Is Word 2008 and 2009 better than Word 2007 encryption ? Which encryption
method would you recommend ?

thanks for the reply

 

[Tony Jollans]

I have no experience of third party tools - if they do not faithfully
decrypt, I am a little surprised, but they are effectively worse than
useless if that is the case.

As I said before, the default encryption of Word-2007 format documents, by
Word 2007 (using AES with up to 256-bit keys) is strong and reliable -
Microsoft have put a lot of effort into making it so, and correcting the
errors of the past. Of course there will be advances both in encryption and
the breaking of encryption over time, but for the moment I am happy to
recommend it.

Word 2008 is the Mac version and I do not know anything of encryption on
the Mac, so can make no comment on that. Word 2009 is not a product, so I
don't understand that part of the question, sorry.