Protect PDF from printing

[gachunt]

... Concerns about PDF protection aside, that it's not very good, easily broken, etc ... I know it's not great, but I still have to do it.

I'm writing a script that watches a folder where documents are scanned into PDF format.

The script creates a thumbnail of the scanned PDF's first page using Imagemagick.

Next, it needs to protect the document from printing, but still allow opening WITHOUT being prompted for a password. That's where I'm stuck.

Using CAM::PDF, I have:

$pdf->setPrefs('password','password');

But, that is protecting the PDF from opening as well.

When I try to use only one argument (and variations of) such as:

$pdf->setPrefs('password');<BR>
$pdf->setPrefs('password','');<BR>
$pdf->setPrefs('','password');

Then the PDF still prompts for a password when opening, or opens with blank white pages and the scanned text is gone.

Any suggestions? or alternates to CAM::PDF?

Using ActiveState, Windows 2012 Server

[Anonymous Monk]

http://search.cpan.org/tools/CAM-PDF -> http://search.cpan.org/grep?cpanid=CDOLAN&release=CAM-PDF-1.60&string=print&i=1&n=1&C=0

Read more... (2 kB)

its  my @prefs = $doc->getPrefs();

so http://search.cpan.org/grep?cpanid=CDOLAN&release=CAM-PDF-1.60&string=prefs&i=1&n=1&C=0

2944:=item $doc->setPrefs($ownerpass, $userpass, $print?, $modify?, $copy?, $add?)

So there you have it, use https://metacpan.org/pod/CAM::PDF#doc-setPrefs-ownerpass-userpass-print-modify-copy-add

[Anonymous Monk]

$ rewritepdf --prefs 0 0 0 0  goner-labels01.pdf goner-labels01000.pdf

$ pdfinfo goner-labels01.pdf goner-labels01000.pdf
File:         goner-labels01.pdf
File Size:    2069 bytes
Pages:        1
Author:       PDF Labelmaker
Producer:     PDF::Create version 1.10
Title:        My Labels
Type:         Info
Page Size:    variable
Optimized:    no
PDF version:  1.2
Security
  Passwd:     none
  Print:      yes
  Modify:     yes
  Copy:       yes
  Add:        yes
---------------------------------
File:         goner-labels01000.pdf
File Size:    2325 bytes
Pages:        1
Author:       PDF Labelmaker
Producer:     PDF::Create version 1.10
Title:        My Labels
Type:         Info
Page Size:    variable
Optimized:    no
PDF version:  1.2
Security
  Passwd:     none
  Print:      no
  Modify:     no
  Copy:       no
  Add:        no

[gachunt]

No luck - Here's what happens

This attempt protects from printing, but there's no password assigned, so printing can easily be turned on:

rewritepdf.pl --prefs 0 0 0 0 file.pdf file1.pdf

This attempt password protects printing -- but also requires a password to open the pdf:

rewritepdf.pl -p password password --prefs 0 0 0 0 file.pdf file1.pdf

This attempt password protects printing -- but the pdf only displays blank pages -- it erases the content:

rewritepdf.pl -p password --prefs 0 0 0 0 file.pdf file1.pdf

I've tried different PDF documents/pdf versions, but all documents end up blank

[gachunt]

I went with using ghostscript instead

For those who want to do something similar, execute this from your script:

"C:\Program Files\gs\gs9.16\bin\gswin64c" -dNOPAUSE -dBATCH -sDEVICE=pdfwrite -sOwnerPassword=password -dPermissions=-64 -sOutputFile=\BICRwatch\protected.pdf \BICRwatch\file.pdf

Here's the command explained:

-dNOPAUSE stops ghostscript from asking questions during the process

-dBATCH quits ghostscript after protection is applied

dPermissions=-64 sets permissions to not allow any printing, editing, copying

The rest should be self-explantory to edit.