Forgot PDF Password? How to Remove Password from PDF
One of the best benefits when working with a PDF file is that you can add a password to protect it. While this comes in handy for those who want to secure their personal and sensitive data, one major drawback is that you need to type in the password each time you want to access your file.
If the secured PDF file was not used frequently, then it is highly possible to forget the password. This is a common issue in nowadays digital life as there are so many passwords to be remembered. Luckily, we can remove the password after it is cracked by third-party software. However, not all of them work as some may damage your personal data. With that in mind, we are willing to help.
In this guide, we are going to walk you through the steps on how to remove password from PDF file. Before we tell you about the easy steps, there are a couple of things you need to know about cracking the password of PDF.
First, Check PDF Password Protection Type
You can set two PDF protection types for a PDF file, including PDF owner password and document-open password. Each offers different security privileges that you need to know about. We recommend you enable both of them to make sure your PDF files are safe and sound. Here is why.
If you set an open password for PDF file, someone cannot see the content inside it unless they provide the correct password. Once they are in, they can edit or make a change to the file without any restrictions.
An owner password PDF prevents people from editing or printing. Those restrictions will be removed once the proper password is granted. So it is also called PDF permission password. With this type of protection, people who get this file can view the content of PDF file but unable to print it.
In short, if you are looking to add an extra layer of security to your PDF file, it’s a good idea to enable both PDF protection types.
As mentioned above, there are ways to remove password from PDF file. However, we are going for the easiest ones that 100% work for you.
iSeePassword Dr.PDF: Remove Both Open Password and Permission Password from PDF
iSeePassword is a big name in the password cracking software market and it has its own tool for removing PDF’s password, called Dr. PDF. In fact, the tool lets you remove password of any PDF file out there. To pull this off, it uses one of the three attack types, including brute-force attack, brute-force with Mask Attack, and Dictionary Attack. Here are the steps:
For Removing Open Password from PDF
Download Dr.PDF from iSeePassword official page and Once the download is complete, install it on your computer. Open the tool on your computer and then you should see two options including Recover Open Password from PDF and Remove Owner Password from PDF.
Select the first option and proceed to the next step. Click Add to locate your PDF file. Now select your attack type from the list and then hit the Start button.
Wait until you see a message, saying the password has been found successfully. Now, copy the password and unlock the secure PDF file with it. Once you get into the PDF file, you can remove password from it with any PDF software or save it as another file.
For Removing Owner Password from PDF
If you want to remove the owner password from your PDF file, go back to the main interface and select the Remove Owner Password from PDF option.
Select where you want to save your PDF file and hit the Start button. Once it is done, you now can print, edit, and make any changes to the PDF file.
QPDF: Command Line Utility for Removing PDF Password Protection
If you want to play around with some command lines, then QPDF is a good to go. QPDF is basically a command line-based program that provides many useful capabilities to developers of PDF-based software. The tool also includes the ability to remove open password from your PDF. Here is how:
Unlike Dr. PDF, QPDF is completely free and won’t charge you anything. However, as it’s an open-source tool, it still needs more polishing.
Download the tool and then install it on your computer. Once you have it installed on your machine, enter the following command:
qpdf — decrypt — password=12345 encrypted_file.pdf output_file.pdf
- Replace –password with open password.
- Output_file: The name of your PDF file.
The tool will remove the password from your PDF file, so you can access it without a password.
Note that this approach only works if you know the open password of PDF file. If an owner password is set, you still cannot edit or make any changes to it.
Unlock-pdf.com: Remove Password from PDF Online
If you don’t want to install any third-party app to remove password from PDF file, then you can go for an online service. We recommend you try Unlock-pdf.com as it is fast and reliable. Here are the steps:
Head over to Unlock-pdf.com and then click on Choose File to locate your PDF file. Once you are done, hit the Unlock File button and let the tool do the job. Once it is done, you can download the file onto your computer.
Note: This tool only works for PDF files locked for printing or copy operations. In other words, if you set an owner password for your PDF file, it is quite simple to use this tool to remove PDF restrictions imposed on it.
John the Ripper: Full Featured Password Cracker
John the Ripper is a free password cracker that’s willing to remove or retrieve PDF password. What sets it apart from other tools above is that it combines multiple passwords into one package and includes a customizable cracker. It can decrypt various password formats in Windows, Windows NT, or Linux.
Once you have it installed on your computer, open it and use this command to extract the crackable information from secure PDF file:
tools/JohnTheRipper/pdf2john.pl secret.pdf > hash
Enter this command to crack PDF password:
john — wordlist=/root/wordlists/1000000-password-seclists.txt hash
Freemypdf.com: Remove Password from Viewable PDF File
This is another great online PDF cracker you need to check out. It’s completely free and super-fast. Like Unlock-pdf.com, the tool is used only for owner password-protected PDFs. Here is how:
Head over to Freemypdf.com and click on Choose file to locate your PDF file. The tool will unlock your PDF file so you can edit or print it (the process takes seconds).
The Best Option?
Removing password protect from PDF is super easy when it is protected by an owner password. You can use any of the software suggested above to get it fone. However, it becomes a tough task when the PDF is secured by an open password. It could take a lot of more time to crack the password if it was strong enough. The best solution is iSeePassword Dr.PDF, which has multiple password cracking engines with GPU acceleration. This makes password cracking much faster and saves tremendous time on this task.
