A new feature in Adobe Reader and Adobe Acrobat will warn users when PDF documents are tagged for Web tracking.Adobe Systems Inc. wants you to know when your PDF documents are being tracked.
The company's Acrobat and Reader software products have been updated to give users a pop-up warning when a document that is tagged for tracking attempts to make a connection to a Web service.
Adobe Director of Security Solutions John Landwehr confirmed that the feature has been added to version 7.05 of the two products in order to offer "security and privacy" to PDF users.
"As Web services become more and more pervasive and new technologies get deployed, it's important to look at the security and privacy implications of desktop applications communicating over a network," Landwehr said in an interview with eWEEK.
The new feature appears to have been created in response to Toronto-based company Remote Approach Inc.'s online service for tagging and tracking PDF files.
Remote Approach's online service lets businesses tag PDF files for distribution. When the PDF is read, it interacts with a network service to record the event and create reports on the movement of the document.
However, with the Adobe update, the end user will receive a pop-up dialog box every time the PDF file attempts to make a connection with a Web service.
"It's designed to alert the user that the application has been requested to make such a call and give the user the choice whether to make the network call or not," Landwehr said.
"Whether it's the Remote Approach service or any other type of service making the call, we give the user the option of stopping the connection," he added.
Landwehr said the feature is designed to be "straightforward and informative" about the way Acrobat or Reader are making network connections. "It'll tell you the location that is being requested to be contacted and give you the choice to say yes or no."
The dialog box will also allow users to save the choices to allow traffic to a particular URL.
Adobe plans to adopt a security patch release schedule. Click here to read more.
"It is broad in its scope and it's not just for blocking a specific service. If there are companies such as Remote Approach that are automatically triggering Web services when a [PDF] document is opened, we think the end user should get a notification."
"When there's traffic moving from the application to the network without the user's knowledge, that's something we want to address," Landwehr added.
Adobe Reader is the de facto standard used to displays and print PDF files, while Adobe Acrobat is a document exchange software that allows documents to be displayed and printed the same on every computer.
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