How do I stop others using 'Save As' to unprotect a document?

[Guest]

When I save a document/template after protecting it with open and modify
passwords and read only, it is still possible for others to save the document
with a different name and unprotect it and edit to their heart's content!!!
As this is a form template (Yes, I have protected it as a form) It is my
wish that no-one else can edit it, apart from using the form fields.
Please help as this is really frustrating.
Many thanks in advance.

Ian

 

[Cindy M -WordMVP-]

Hi =?Utf-8?B?SWFuIEc=?=,

When I save a document/template after protecting it with open and modify
passwords and read only, it is still possible for others to save the document
with a different name and unprotect it and edit to their heart's content!!!
As this is a form template (Yes, I have protected it as a form) It is my
wish that no-one else can edit it, apart from using the form fields.

Form field protection is more a convenience than anything else. There is NO way
to make a document protected in this manner completely "untouchable".

Best you can do is to have Word 2003 and use IRM (Rights management) to make
parts of a document truly "untouchable". For that, you need a Windows 2003
server somewhere to enforce the Rights Management (you can find more about that
at microsoft.com).

Cindy Meister
INTER-Solutions, Switzerland
http://homepage.swissonline.ch/cindymeister (last update Jun 8 2004)
http://www.word.mvps.org

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[Guest]

Cindy,
Many thanks for the solution, I suspected this would be the case as I use
Office 2003 at home, but my workplace uses Office 2000 on a LAN. I think my
only option now is to convert the form to PDF and use Adobe's protection.
Here's hoping my IT dept will allow the purchase of Adobe Acrobat Pro (We all
have our dreams LOL).
Thanks again

Regards - Ian

 

[Graham Mayor]

I'm afraid neither Acrobat or Cindy's suggestion will make the document
truly inpenetrable. Any document that you allow someone to see can be
duplicated. All you can hope for is to make things a little more difficult
for the average user.

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Graham Mayor - Word MVP

My web site www.gmayor.com

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