Cracking the password protected PDF document
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Hi
I am working on 40 pages Livecycle form and on the last page, I have section called "Office Use Only" where the user should not do anything with that page beneath to that section having a text field where we want to enter the password, if we enter the password, two checkboxes (work like radio button) will be visible "PageCheckbox" and "SectionCheckbox" and also with the "Extract" button and this to extract the forms by pages wise or section wise after checking the checkbox based on the selection Section headings will be visible and we will click extract button to extract the pages either page wise or section wise.
And code which we used was working fine and we sent to the user after getting the pdf with data filled by user, we got surprised that without entering the password in "Office Use Only" section the checkboxes and extract button are visible.
We have restricted the document so, they can only enter the values in the fields or they can take prints and they can't even open the documents in "IE" or "Google Chrome".
The user did not use any online softwares to crack the password protection and how the checkboxes and section headings are visible.
Can anyone give some suggestions, what are all the ways to crack the password without using any online softwares?
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Hi,
Can you share the document using a file sharing service? That way we can investigate the form and see how the fields became visible.
Regards
Malcolm
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Thanks for your prompt response really appreciate it.
Apologies, the data's in the form are highly confidential and I should not share the file .
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Hi,
I meant the original form, not filled in with any data, just blank, is that possible? if not there is not a lot we can do to help, there are many ways to break a password, brute force, lucky guess, and so on.
Without the form and the code that you are running to make the password field and checkboxes show, it is not really possible for us to diagnose the problem.
Regards
Malcolm
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Is this a dynamic form or a static form. In other words, depending on how much data is entered, might the number of pages change or will the layout change?
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It's a dynamic form and many JavaScript functionality added, the page numbers will be increased based on the user's data, if the user wants to add additional user account, we gave the option to them to click the button and add additional accounts.
When the form opens it has 40 pages in total.
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With a dynamic form, you won't be able to extract the pages using a script. I suggest you rethink the process.
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how did you restrict the document? Acrobat's password encryption impacts the entire pdf ,and not sections/pages of it.
If you are using script to make certain fields access's properties readOnly or protected via script, there may some issue with the script. Are you using the password field in conjunction with some script?
As Malcolm has indicated without the original blank form to review, it will be difficult to help further here. Can you send the PDF for review?
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What password protection did you add to the XFA form.

