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Any way to prevent people from embedding a protected document in a new Word document?

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    Any way to prevent people from embedding a protected document in a new Word document?

    Hi All,

    I hope someone can help me, but I fear I already know the answer to this question.

    I have a document that has macros enabled. The document is protected for filling in forms (so copy of text is forbidden). The macros control what is printed. The text is hidden and the macros unhide the various text so that if macros are disabled all you get is a blank sheet. In other words, I don't want anyone touching the text in the document, editing it in any way so that EVERYONE MUST use the macros.

    However I have recently seen online that you can remove protection by opening a new Word doc and Clicking Insert Object - Text From File which will take all the text out of the Word document you select and paste it into the blank document thus removing all protection and allowing the document to be edited.

    I don't like the idea of this (although I'm sure nobody in my work will know about this).

    Is there any way of stopping this from happening? Is there any trick that i can apply to the text in the protected document that, when copied into the new document it will not resemble the protected document?

    Any tips welcome.

    Thanks in advance,

    Andre
    Last edited by Alves76; 04-18-2013 at 04:27 AM.

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    Forum Expert macropod's Avatar
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    Re: Any way to prevent people from embedding a protected document in a new Word document?

    Hi Andre,

    You cannot prevent people using that approach.

    In any event, trying to control what is displayed/printed on a document using formfields via the 'hidden' font attribute is a waste of time. Despite your attempts to control what is displayed/printed, the final decision rests with the user, not the form designer. All one needs to do to circumvent your attempt is to turn on Word's hidden text dsiplay and/or print options and all will be revealed.

    Accordingly, if you're really concerned about effective control, you need to programmatically control whether the content with which your are concerned is actually present in the document.
    Cheers,
    Paul Edstein
    [Fmr MS MVP - Word]

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    Re: Any way to prevent people from embedding a protected document in a new Word document?

    Hi Paul,

    Thanks for your comment. I feared that there was no way around my problem.

    As far as I can see this is the only way that the common user can circumvent my security. The userforms cannot be closed without closing the document. The macros are password protected. The text isn't hidden to stop people seeing what the text is, the macros let the user select which part of the document they want to print, but the object is that users MUST use the macros and can't cheat the system by printing a duplicate copy.

    That said, I designed somewhat of a CAPTCHA to use instead. I've saved a small jpg that isn't in the original document, but the code grabs it from a location that nobody will be able to find (without a lot of luck) and places it in the bottom left hand corner thus highlighting to a reviewer of the document that it was generated in the correct manner.

    It's pretty much like your suggestion - it's a way to control what's present in the document.

    I appreciate you taking the time to respond.

    Kind regards,

    Andre

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