How to print safely from Protected View

[bob8147]

It is well known that PDF files are a major vector for malware. Every day I get phishing emails that try to trick me into opening some dangerous PDF.

Yet there are many PDFs on the internet that I need to read. So I use the excellent feature called 'Protected Mode' or 'Protected View' in Acrobat Reader to guard against any possible malware. This works fine.

However, sometimes I need to print out information from the file. In order to do this I have to disable the Protected View using the button 'Enable All Features'. Why? This is crazy. If I enable all features I will expose myself to ALL the risks that may be in the document. Going forward, the document will be treated as if it is completely trusted in every respect and will be marked that way for ever more.

In Protected View there is a nicely rendered image of the document on the screen. I just want to print that image. Why is it not possible for Adobe Reader to to print that image without disabling every other security feature?

Please advise how I can safely print out content from a document that I don't trust completely.

[Test Screen Name]

Protected View is an idea that came from Microsoft. The idea isn't that you can get your work done with it on. The idea is that you use protected view to take a look at the document and verify that it is what it seems to be, before switching the option off so you can work.

[try67]

I don't think that "PDF files are a major vector for malware". Most of the time it's files pretending to be PDFs that deliver malware, as people double-click them without making sure they are actually what they seem to be (partially because of the Windows setting which hides the file extensions of know file types).

PDF files are actually extremely limited in what they can and can't do on your system, much less so than Office files, for example, especially macro-enabled ones.

[bob8147]

I'm not as complacent as @try67 about the risk of malware in PDFs. Just Google to get a flavour of common PDF based malware attacks. This 2010 paper​ from Symantec explains some scenarios in detail. By now Adobe will have patched those vunerabilities, but the overall situation is unlikely to have improved.

In fact the Protected View we're talking about is an example of Adobe's response to exactly these risks.

The suggestion from @Test Screen Name helps in some circumstances. If a colleague tells you he is sending a file, then you can check the contents when you receive it. My situation is different. If I search online for a particular topic, I may find a PDF with relevant information. But I don't know if it's been specially crafted to catch unwary people. Someone may have modified an apparently useful document by adding malware to it. Just looking at the text won't tell me if it's safe or not.

[shaktikeshri]

Hi bob8147,

Protected View is a read only feature and it only allows you to read. Printing is not allowed in Protected View.

As a workaround you can do the following:

1. Print the document by switching out of protected View. The document will be trusted by this.
2. But still if you feel that document is not trustworthy then after printing remove that document from your trusted locations. Remove the document/location from Edit->Preferences -> Security(Enhanced)
3. Next time when you open the document from the same path, it will again open in Protected View.

Thanks,

Shakti K

[bob8147 · Accepted solution]

Sorry. None of these answers is much help at all.

Of course I can turn the protection off and then turn it back on again. By which time any malware would have done its work.

So if I find an online document from an unknown source, there is absolutely no way to print the contents safely. Perhaps Adobe should redesign this feature.