How to Unsecure a Secured PDF File on Mac & Windows

“I recently received many PDF reports from my boss and it’s purely secured. Also, I am using MAC OS X. When I tried to print them, I found that the “print” icon is disabled. Can anyone help me to deal with this problem and how to enable the option in PDF documents? I really need to print these reports to submit by today. Please suggest a fast and quick way to unsecure a secured PDF file on MAC OS.”

Adobe Reader is well-known document reader software that is platform-independent and free for viewing the document in Windows, MAC, Linux, etc. PDF(Portable Document Format) has various advantages such as easy sharing of files, compatibility, secured. But sometimes this security cause trouble like in the above-mentioned query. However, PDF allows the digital documents to be secured via passwords and permissions which increase their authenticity.

Method 1: Unsecure a Secured PDF File by Using Safe Tool

Quick Tip: Use PDF Password Remover, which comes with easy steps to unsecure a secured PDF file. This professional software can unsecure PDF documents in a just few clicks.

Undoubtedly, this utility provides an incredible solution to this issue. It allows you to Easily Unlock PDF Form in Bulk at once. With this, you enable the secure option from PDF files in bulk. It disables all the restrictions like printing, copying, commenting, etc. applied in the PDF.

Steps to Unsecure PDF File

Step 1- Launch the mentioned tool, and upload the PDF file by using Add Files / Folders option.

Step 2- After choosing the folders, enter the password carefully. And click on “Next”.

Step 3- Here, on your right, you can select “Change” to change the destination of the PDF files. Also, here the status is pending.

Step 4: Hit the “Unlock” button to proceed further. Now the status is changed to completed. Click to “OK”.

Step 5- Select View Report, and see the final unsecured PDF data.

Method  2: Using Google Chrome Web Browser

For this, you need a web browser it can be Google Chrome, Firefox, or Edge. It’s a simple hack to unsecure PDF documents. It’s not known to everyone, so here are the steps to Remove Encryption From PDF files:

Tip: It works the same for every browser.

Step 1- Open the PDF file in Chrome Browser.
Step 2- Now a dialogue box will open, it will ask you to enter the password for the document. Type the correct password otherwise, it won’t move to the next step. Click to “OK”.

Step 3- Press the “Ctrl + p” from the keyboard, it will open the printing settings. In this, no need to enable the print option, instead of printing use this easy trick.

Alert: If the print option is disabled then this method will not work.

Step 4- In this step, you can see the multiple options in your left panel below the print option. Go to the destination option row where you see a “Change” option. Click to “Change”.

Step 5- Here, you see options for your destination for the file. Go to the left-bottom and select “Save as PDF” from a local destination.

Step 6- Now hit the “Save” button. The file has been saved in PDF format.

When you open the document in Adobe Acrobat Reader it won’t ask you for the password as well as you can go to File>>Document Properties>>Security and view the permissions associated with the PDF document.

Limitation

It won’t work for a group of folders, it’s only feasible for a single file. Suppose the user wants to unsecure a secured PDF file in bulk. Then, this manual approach can’t be used. Unlocking each file one by one is time-consuming as well. Also, it works when the “Print” option is enabled.

What if the “Print” option is Disabled?

Here are some methods which will work when this happens.

Method 2: Adobe Acrobat Pro

This is a tool or utility provided by Adobe for both Windows and MAC OS. Most of the users are using this updated version. In this, users need the password for the 1 step authentication as the above method. This can be used when the “Print” option is disabled but it is needed that the user should know the permission password. Unlike, the above method which only works When PDF has enabled the “Print” option in the permission settings.

Limitation: It doesn’t unsecure secured PDF files in batches. Moreover, it is pretty expensive as compared to other utilities.

Method 3: Preview

This is an inbuilt utility provided by MAC OS X to view PDF documents. This Preview application can also be used to unsecure a (secured) portable document format (PDF) file. By using this application users can disable the secure option in PDF documents. This can be done in 3 easy steps.

Step 1- Open the PDF document by Preview

Step 2- Now, it will ask for a password because it is encrypted by a passkey. Type the correct password.

Step 3- To disable owner-level permissions. Go to the File menu located on the left of the top panel. Then select “Save” from the drop-down.

Step 4- Here, choose “Password-Free” in save as. Also, can change the location of this PDF file. Then hit the “Save” button located below.

Disadvantage: It doesn’t support the above function in batches.

Final Words

Hopefully, the above-explained tricks and methods are worthy to unsecure a secured PDF file. Also, the approaches mentioned above provide a solution to any issue related to the bank statement or salary slips and confidential information unsecured. Consequently, #method 4 eliminates the limitations of other methods and unsecured the security lock on PDF files in batch. But it’s wise to discover it by yourself.