Remove copy protection from PDF documents

This is probably illegal, so use it at your own risk.
Some PDFs on the internet have a copy protection to make sure you cannot copy-paste any content from the PDF into a document you're writing. To circumvent this protection there are several tools available on the internet. I haven't tried any of them, because they're not free ;)
There is however a procedure that will enable you to circumvent the copy protection using free tools. The trick is to convert the PDF to a PS (PostScript) document first and then convert it back into a PDF.
So, download Ghostview en Ghostscript from: http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost/.
Next, open your PDF in Ghostview.
Next, from the "File" menu, select "Convert" (a dialog will pop up)
Press "Ok"
Fill in the name of the "converted" file.
Press "Save"
Tada, you can now copy content from your newly created PDF ;)

Comments

Anonymous said…
thanks - this DOES work pretty good,
I'm loosing some images though but not to worry
cheers
nick
Anonymous said…
Works like a charm!!!
Thanks ALOT ;)
Anonymous said…
Got any tips for a DRM protected PDF? The PDF document I am trying to view is protected by LockLizard http://www.locklizard.com and I can't find any way around it. Printing is disabled and I can't do any screen captures...
Anonymous said…
Thank you so much. Works perfect!!
Very good indeed. And I used this not for making any illegal thing.
Anonymous said…
if you have pdf pseudoprinter, you can easily print the pdf and open the resulting file...
Anonymous said…
Thank you, worked like a charm. Loads of text needed from a government document.

When the same government want sme to write a procedure based on their PDF for their government!!! Arghh to typing all that out again!

Ghost was excellent, I can now manipulate the text and do my job.


THanks.
Anonymous said…
you are cool buddy:)
chears
Anonymous said…
give us some tips , how to save protected online display page book.
it will be great, please help us.
Yes, one can remove copy protection from PDF also with Unrestrict PDF tool.
Simona said…
Thank you very much. It perfectly solved this problem :)
kamesh said…
its working but we cannot edit that content... all pdf converters can also do this..
thx for sharing ...xoxo
Anonymous said…
This does work, thanks a lot.
Anonymous said…
Holy f... it works as advertized!!!

Thank you very much, now i can copy some code instead of writing it by hand.
Anonymous said…
amazing! it works
Anonymous said…
Best option is www.freemypdf.com, just upload the file and they will give you an unlocked download after 10 seconds.

Cheers

BigJoJo
Anonymous said…
did not work out for me :( .. the pdf still remains the same .. I can copy text but if I paste it .. all I get is tiny boxes instead of text !

Am I missing something , or does this work on small sub set ?
Maybe there's a problem with the font or encoding. Not sure ...
Anonymous said…
Excellent job, it works fine!
Thanks!
Amy Pond said…
It is irritating when I buy a pdf for learning how to do something thing I can't get to the links. They won't hot link and I can't copy them.
GRRRRR!
I couldn't figure out how to install Ghostwriter. Something is not coming through to me.
Is there any other site for help? The original site is too techy for me.
No place for an email to be notified of updates. I will check back for pity notes.
marhta01 said…
Don't know what's wrong but this didn't work for me may be the 128-bit encryption could be the reason. But while goggling i found another pdf unlocker that worked for me, for more info and trial version of this product you can go here

www.pdfunlockers..com
Lyrae said…
sorry but that didn't work and here's what the error message read:

%%[ ProductName: Distiller ]%%
This PostScript file was created from an encrypted PDF file.
Redistilling encrypted PDF is not permitted.
%%[ Flushing: rest of job (to end-of-file) will be ignored ]%%
%%[ Warning: PostScript error. No PDF file produced. ] %%


Any further suggestions?
Anonymous said…
Works grate, thanks a lot!
IgnacioCorto said…
I use Ghostview and TequilaCat to create ebooks to read on my mobile phones.

Many thanks for this help!
IgnacioCorto said…
I use Ghostview and TequilaCat to create ebooks to read on my mobile phones.

Many thanks for this help!
Where is the menu? I only see a text interface.

Käännöstoimisto
Anonymous said…
Use Apache Tikka and extract all the text from it using the java program:
Add following 3 jar files to the classpath: tika-app-1.0.jar; tika-core-1.0.jar; tika-parsers-1.0.jar

public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException, SAXException, TikaException {
File file = new File("C:/test.pdf");
FileInputStream fs = null;
fs = new FileInputStream(file);
Parser parser = new AutoDetectParser();
ContentHandler handler = new BodyContentHandler(Integer.MAX_VALUE);
ParseContext context = new ParseContext();
context.set(Parser.class, parser);
Metadata metadata = new Metadata();
metadata.set(Metadata.RESOURCE_NAME_KEY, file.getName());

parser.parse(fs, handler, metadata, new ParseContext());
String fileContent = handler.toString();
System.out.println(fileContent);
}
Unknown said…
Nowadays, there are lot of programs that can remove password protection from a PDF file. You can try this PDF unlocker as well:

http://mypdfsolutions.com/

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