Hi there,

What is the best way to protect a PDF Ebook ?

I want to be able to ensure people canīt share it, print it, screenshot it etc.

Any ideas gratefully received. I looked at a few services, the best one looks like "LockLizard" but its so damn expensive, 2.5kUSD.

Guess this is the place to ask, as you may be able to tell me what you "cant crack"... lol.

Thanks to all. Great site.

So what's the use of the ebook then?

your ebook will be shared for free? that's the owner risk!

i think you can't protect pdf ebook

Best protection i have seen is when the paypal name and email are auto printed to each copy of the ebook upon purchase and download! That then discourages people from sharing it publicly.

Lewi

you would have to write code that checks registration info at a server before it opens or use locklizard and those services but Nothing will prevent copying 100%.

You don't want to piss off customers with software installs and having to be connected to internet just to read. Just focus on selling the PDF and then creating more, that's what the pros do

There are a couple of programs

default password protection
secure-ebook
file-secure
locklizard

The one that prevents screencapture, printing etc... is file-secure pro and locklizard, but if you run it in sandbox, or alter the code to prevent it from hooking into the api, then you can use snagit / screen capture program to copy it, then repaste it into a pdf

Thanks. Iīll look at those options, good to have something to compare to locklizard.

I plan on using virtual vault to protect my E-books its 29.95 per month for unlimited use. The price is decent if you plan on making a fair amount of sales and want to keep your E-book protected.

Can read more about it here hxxp ebook-security dot com / index dot html

Originally Posted by lewi

Best protection i have seen is when the paypal name and email are auto printed to each copy of the ebook upon purchase and download! That then discourages people from sharing it publicly.

Lewi

ugh edit and erase it with fox editor..easy. next

best protection is to give such a value with the ebook that it would be stupid reselling or sharing it

you cannot protect it trust me.

there is a method that works on anything written and impossible to stop if you know what your doing it's easy to really may take an hour if your quick about it

Just use Ejunkie. They have stamp feature which means buyer's email address and transaction no will be stamped on each page of your PDF. This will at least give you some level of safety..

Don't rely on password security. I have pdf password remover soft that can remove any sorts of protection within second...

Wait a minute, you're trying to stop people from sharing your book but you post here on BHW? Isn't that an oxymoron? It's like being a member of a nudist colony but trying to stop nudity!

Originally Posted by david wright

Wait a minute, you're trying to stop people from sharing your book but you post here on BHW? Isn't that an oxymoron? It's like being a member of a nudist colony but trying to stop nudity!

I like your comparison.


on topic for everyone else :
you CAN NOT 100% fully copy protect any document that can be physically viewed on a monitor

think about it and how you can replicate text and still image that you can view as an ebook or any format

it's pretty easy

You can't protect a PDF by traditional methods.
There are some tweaks you can do (like integrating the PDF in a .exe and displaying a registration system that connects to a server) but it's not worth it.

If your ebook is that good that it's going to spread "free" over the internet, than it means thousands of people already bought it and you are rich

So focus on selling, that's the hard part.

the only way to attempt to stop sharing is if you have enough trust with people to make the pdf an exe and have a phone home every startup....
at least make it more difficult to share where someone has to crack it...

I always get this when I tell people that I've been making money online with a .pdf. (via Clickbank) "What if someone steals it? Aren't you worried?"

I'd only be worried if Clickbank doesn't send me the $6,000 I get from it yearly.

I have yet to see my product make the rounds online. It's got nothing to do with making money online, SEO or marketing. Most of the people who buy it are "civilians" and have no idea even how to find a copy of it if it WERE available.

The ONE product that I made that DID relate to online marketing (iMacro training videos) was copied and propagated to all the forums within 3 days of posting it on the WF. (f*ckers) :-P

I know buy a vault lock it in there and forget the key

Originally Posted by nazareth1983

I plan on using virtual vault to protect my E-books its 29.95 per month for unlimited use. The price is decent if you plan on making a fair amount of sales and want to keep your E-book protected.

Can read more about it here hxxp ebook-security dot com / index dot html

Virtual Vault sucks!

It has been awhile since I used it. Had many issues with it. Emailed their support several times. Received no response. Worst support that I have ever seen! Also, once you distribute the protected Ebook with Virtual Vault, you would have to keep paying the $29.95 a month in order for your protected Ebooks to work. Once you cancel your subscription, then every one of your customers Ebooks will stop working.

I have used and recommend Software Passport. siliconrealms dot com.

With Software Passport, you can lock it to the persons computer.

Originally Posted by SleepieGirl

the only way to attempt to stop sharing is if you have enough trust with people to make the pdf an exe and have a phone home every startup....
at least make it more difficult to share where someone has to crack it...

any on screen text and images can be replicated doesn't matter if it's exe etc. etc.

NOTHING will protect an ebook if you really want to copy it.

the less pages the better but it's not hard to do really but you have to put in the effort which most don't

Almost each method to lock a pdf will be bypassed.

"Almost all" LOL.

One really good example is:

maddengurus.com/forums/index.php

I purchased their product with videos, data etc and they only allow you to open it form 1 computer. I tried to move to another computer and it wouldn't allow me to do it. It may be worth a few bucks to buy it and figure out how they do it. I'm pretty good w/ these kinds of things and I couldn't get it working.

It's the best one I've seen yet...

Lets face it, there will always be someone who will crack it for their needs, but if you can stop the majority of general "non black hat" type users, then you are better off than before.

Most of my sales go to people who are unlikely to go to extreme lengths to crack it, but it it were just to send it easily via mail to their friend, then they probably will do - If it takes a hard crack to enable this, then they prob wont.

Thatīs how I look at it.

Thanks to everyone for their constructive replies.

Well, It's definitly impossible to secure a pdf.

Yes you can have a password, yes you can print the buyer email on each page and yes you can embed a stealth digital signature in your pdf, but...

There will be always a way that permit to extract the content (image/text/video) a of PDF. ALWAYS. Nothing to do with that.

That's the same for client application : they are always cracked. The only application which are secure are the application which are hosted on server : software as a service (SaaS).

In your case it's not applicable too, because even if you host content which are video/server/text on a remote server it will be always possible to download/extract them...

It's definetly impossible to protect data like text/video/audio, but like he's saying biks not every people will know how to get cracked version of your pdf

Hey, thanks.

Just been looking at this. Doesnīt this only deal with exe files though ? Its a PDF I want to protect.

Thanks for your input.

Originally Posted by MikeLac

Virtual Vault sucks!

It has been awhile since I used it. Had many issues with it. Emailed their support several times. Received no response. Worst support that I have ever seen! Also, once you distribute the protected Ebook with Virtual Vault, you would have to keep paying the $29.95 a month in order for your protected Ebooks to work. Once you cancel your subscription, then every one of your customers Ebooks will stop working.

I have used and recommend Software Passport. siliconrealms dot com.

With Software Passport, you can lock it to the persons computer.

Originally Posted by BonTrade

I want to be able to ensure people canīt share it, print it, screenshot it etc.

Keep it off-line, in safe secured place and never show it anyone.

you could try to put a password on the pdf

Mine is chock full of upsells - anybody want to steal mine and spread around the world? PLEASE!

you can't prevent it but put in tons of links to your own site so anyone who copies and shares it will be sending more people to your site, where you can sell them more stuff. It's the same with youtube videos. They all get copied, so may as well blast your own domain all over em and get the free promotion that comes from the copiers.

Maybe you could manually put the whole thing in a spinner, knock out 1,000 different versions and give each person a unique version. (Keep a record of who gets which one)

That way, even if they copy it by hand you'll know who the culprit is.

Hi friends.
As we know PDF files are very important for us. So we should take take care of them.
Few months before, someone did editing and copying from my .pdf files. I was really frustrated due to this.
Then I used a free trial version of .pdf protection tool of sysinfotool. It helped me to protect my all PDF documents. Though it didn't give me the full access but I was quite satisfied with the results. And then for more better results I purchased the full version.
If you wish, you can also check its trial version. It's absolutely free.
And if you feel good, then you can purchase its full version.
Try your luck!

hi,

with WTM Copy Protection or ExeStealth you can protect Ebooks against, copy, screenshots, printing, save and so on. Check it at www.webtoolmaster.com

The whole idea of an ebook is to sell the sauce not the meat: Give away so much valuable info without giving out the secret recipe to the sauce ! Thats how you get your name out their and get clients/buyers out the ass..

As an add-on offer some kind of valuable service for free. To claim this service the buyer needs to email through their PayPal transaction details.

Easier for SEO books as you could give them a Scrapebox blast etc. However, dog walking niche? Get them to send through a photo of their pet and you can give them personalised dog styling suggestions.

It needs to be something unique to each user that can not just be copied and added to the eBook

The other great tip in this thread was to promote your own brand throughout the book, add some afffiliate links in too. Someone would need to go to the additional effort of swapping them all out if they were to want to rip your book off. In most cases even if someone does steal your book you will still see an income from the affiliate earnings as well as promotion for your brand. Watermark any images too, or blend in your logos/brand.

Anyone suggesting that passwords or anything else will work are incorrect if you really want to break something. Worst case scenario I could pay someone $100 (at most) to read through an eBook and retype it in MS Word. They would probably even rewrite it for that price!