Adobe Acrobat is one of the most popular PDF readers, but it costs $20/month to use and to use, encrypt, or enable password protection. For just a simple task, the company is tasking you much more. There are different ways to enable password protection or encrypt PDFs for free without Acrobat.
Encrypt MS Word
This is the primary way to enable encryption on PDFs for free. If you use Microsoft Word, then all things are more straightforward. Despite being one of the most popular and commonly used Word programs, there are other salutations to do the same.
- Open PDF in Microsoft Word, and then click on the File tab.
- From there, select Save As and then choose PDF (.pdf) from the drop-down menu.
- Click on the Option button, Check the checkbox for the “Encrypt the document with Password.”
- Enter your choice of password, and after that, click OK.
Alternative: You can use Microsoft Office, for which you simply open the document and then click on the Info tab. From there, click on Protect Document, and then encrypt with a password.
PDF Converter
This is another way to use a free and easy-to-use PDF converter to password-protect PDFs.
- Download and install PDF Converter. Launch it, and then click on the Add Files button to add files that you want to enable password protection for.
- Next, click on the Encrypt button, and then enter the password of your choice. After typing a password, retype the password to verify.
- Click on the OK button, and then click on Convert to PDF file to encode PDF files.
Alternately, open the PDF Converter and then head over to Advance Settings and then Setup Password. After that, you can click on Add to import your PDF files, and then click on Convert. Now, your PDF file will allow you to set a password, and then open and edit your PDFs.
PDF Editor
You can download the PDF editor of your choice and then launch the program.
- Open the PDF editor, and then click on Protect or Security.
- Enter a password, and then check the box for the Other Security Option.
Use the Command-Line Tool
If you are used to command-line tools, then you can use OpenSSL Command-Line to encrypt PDFs.
- Open the Command Prompt and then enter the PDF file directory.
- Type opensslaes-256-cbc -in input.pdf -out output. Pdf -salt -md sha1 -pass pass: password (Enter the password with the password.)
- This will enable PDF files with an AES-256 encryption algorithm and the Next SHA-1 hash algorithm.
Enable Password Protection for a PDF on macOS
You can enable Password Protect a PDF on macOS using Preview, using the built-in Image and PDF viewer.
- Open the PDF file in preview, and then click on File.
- Choose Export, and then click on the Permission button, after which it asks for the required password to open the document.
- Enter the password of your choice, and it will ask you to retype to verify.
- Click on Apple, and then save.
PDF Element
- Open the PDF file in PDF Element, and then click on the Protect tab.
- After that, click on the Password button, and then enter your password in the password box.
- Click on OK, and then click on the Save button to save an encrypted PDF file.
Alternative: There are similar programs that offer similar features to Adobe Acrobat, like PDFElement, Nitro Pro, Soda PDF, and iLovePDF. You need to remember that. Don’t forget the password because if you lose it, you won’t be able to open the file again. After encrypting or enabling password protection on a PDF, you can rest assured that your PDF is secure.
You can use a Password Manager to generate and store your password. Also, when you share your encrypted PDF, the other person will require a password to open the file. You can use a file archive like WinRAR when you want to password-protect PDFs; however, creating and sharing might be an issue.
Disadvantages of password-protected PDFs
First things first, once you enable password protection on a PDF, if you forget the password, this is a problem because then you will not be able to open the PDF. There are some crack-password-protected PDFs available that you can use to determine access to the PDF. You should be aware of the risks involved in this. So ensure that you don’t use a weak password because it can be easily cracked. If you create a strong password, remember the password.
Password-protected PDFs aren’t safe because there are various ways to crack them to get password-protected PDFs. One way is a brute-force attack, which is a type of attack where the attacker tries a combination of passwords. It is possible to crack a password with a brute-force attack if the password is not strong enough. Another way is to use a dictionary attack, which uses a list of common passwords. The last is to use a list of compromised passwords from your computer or mobile device to crack the password.