Before you start
PDF protection is a paid-plan feature and is included with PDF watermarking on Basic, Pro and Enterprise. It is set per product, inside the product's PDF watermarking card, and only works while watermarking is switched on for that product — see Turn on PDF watermarking for your store and Enable PDF watermarking on a specific product. Upload the unlocked, editable version of your PDF; Alva Digital Downloads applies the watermark, the identifier and the protection for each order.
What PDF protection does
Alva Digital Downloads protects each delivered copy with an owner password that only you hold. Your customer opens the file without any password and keeps the everyday rights a buyer expects; the rights that let someone alter or repackage your document are switched off. The invisible forensic marker that ties the copy to the order stays inside the file.
| Your customer can | Your customer cannot |
|---|---|
| Open the file with no password, in any current reader | Edit text, images or page content |
| Print at full quality | Insert, delete, rotate or extract pages (page assembly) |
| Select and copy text and images | Add comments, highlights or other annotations |
| Use screen readers and other accessibility tools | Fill in form fields |
| Follow links and bookmarks inside the document | Remove the restrictions without a tool that ignores them (see below) |
Protection is applied as part of watermarking, so it reaches exactly the PDFs that are watermarked. A PDF you have unticked from watermarking, a personalised product, and non-PDF files are delivered unchanged, without protection.
Turn on protection for a product
1. Open the product mapping
In the Alva Digital Downloads admin, open Products, find the Shopify product, and click into its mapping page. Scroll to the PDF watermarking card. As with watermarking, the card only appears when the mapping has at least one PDF attached.
2. Make sure watermarking is on
Check that Apply PDF watermark to this product's PDFs is switched on. The protection checkbox lives inside this card and is only available while the toggle is on, because protection is applied in the same step that writes the watermark.
3. Tick the protection checkbox
Tick Protect this product's PDFs with an owner password. The help text under it summarises what your customers can and cannot do, and a hint reminds you that the restrictions are a deterrent, not a lock.
4. Enter an owner password
Type your password into the Owner password field. Use 1 to 127 characters with no spaces at the start or end and no line breaks. Only you hold this password — your customers never need it. You will not be able to view it here later, so keep your own copy. Once a password is saved, the field shows "A password is set" and only accepts a replacement.
5. Save the mapping
Click Save at the top of the page. From the next paid order onwards, every watermarked PDF in this product is delivered protected — through the download email, the download page and the customer account alike.
What changes for customers who already bought
Turning protection on, or changing the password, also reaches customers who already bought this product: from their next download onwards they receive a freshly watermarked and protected copy. Turning protection off is not retroactive — those customers keep the protected copy they already have, and only new deliveries go out unprotected. Files in your library are never modified; each customer receives their own copy.
Protection is a deterrent, not a lock
The restrictions are permission flags stored inside the PDF. Acrobat, Reader, Preview and every other mainstream reader respect them, which is what stops a customer casually editing or reassembling your document. But because the file opens with no password, the key that unlocks its content is derivable from the file itself, and tools exist that use this to strip the flags without ever knowing your owner password.
So the owner password stops casual editing, and it stops nobody who is determined. Do not sell your customers "uneditable" files, and do not rely on protection as your only defence.
Combine it with watermarking, which is what actually identifies a leaked copy: the visible stamp names the buyer, and the invisible forensic marker ties the file to the order even after the visible text is cropped away. Protection is the fence; the watermark is the name tag.
What your customers need to open the file
Protected files use 256-bit AES encryption, the current PDF standard. Any reader released in the last fifteen years opens them: Adobe Acrobat and Acrobat Reader X (2010) or newer, Apple Preview, Safari and iOS, Google Chrome, and Firefox all open the file with no password prompt. Very old readers, and some niche PDF libraries, do not understand this encryption and refuse the file with an unsupported-encryption error instead of opening it. If a customer reports that, ask them to update their reader.
Verify a delivered file
Download a copy from any order and check both halves: that the permissions are in place, and that the order identifier is still inside. Either Acrobat or the command line will do.
In Acrobat or Acrobat Reader
Open the file and choose File → Properties. On the Security tab, the security method reads Password Security and the restrictions summary shows printing and content copying as allowed, and changing the document, document assembly, commenting and form filling as not allowed. On the Custom tab, four fields — AlvaOrderId, AlvaPurchaseId, AlvaLicensee and AlvaStampedAt — carry the order that this copy was made for.
On the command line
With qpdf installed, this prints the encryption settings without needing a password:
qpdf --show-encryption file.pdfA correctly protected file reports R = 6 and P = -1324 in the first lines, lists printing and extraction as allowed, and lists every modify permission as not allowed. To read the identifier, use ExifTool, again with no password:
exiftool -AlvaOrderId -AlvaPurchaseId -AlvaLicensee -AlvaStampedAt file.pdfAll four values come back in plain text. This is the procedure Alva Digital Downloads tests against its own output.
Why a text search finds nothing
Do not use a plain text search — grep, a text editor, or a metadata tool that does not decrypt — to look for the order identifier. In a protected PDF the field names are visible but every value is encrypted inside the file, so a search for the order number finds nothing even though the marker is present. Use a PDF-aware tool such as Acrobat, qpdf or ExifTool, which decrypt transparently. If you would rather not, email the file to support and Alva Digital Downloads will identify the original order for you.
Files that already have security restrictions
Some PDFs arrive from the exporting app with security restrictions (for example "prevent copying") already applied. When protection is on, Alva Digital Downloads handles the two kinds differently, and the product page flags each affected file with a banner reading "1 PDF has security restrictions".
- Restrictions that only limit copying or editing. The file opens without a password, so Alva Digital Downloads unlocks it, watermarks it and re-protects it with your owner password for each order automatically. Nothing to do.
- A file that needs a password just to open. Alva Digital Downloads cannot read it, so it cannot be watermarked or protected. That file's delivery is held rather than sent unprotected, and you are emailed. Re-export it without security restrictions and upload it again.
To be safe, re-export every file without security restrictions before you upload it. Detection samples the file rather than reading all of it, so a restricted file can occasionally go unflagged until an order is placed.
If a customer's download is held
Protection fails closed. If the protection step cannot be completed for a file — the file needs a password to open, or the step itself fails — Alva Digital Downloads holds that download rather than deliver an unprotected copy, and sends you a notice email with the subject "Watermarking failed — not delivered" naming the product and the reason. To release the download immediately, untick Protect this product's PDFs with an owner password on that product and save; the customer then receives the watermarked file without protection. Fix the file and switch protection back on when you are ready.
While protection is on, downloads you grant by hand without an order cannot be delivered for that product — there is no order to protect the file for, so the download is held rather than sent unprotected. Turn protection off for the product, or deliver the file another way.
Which plans include PDF protection
PDF protection is included in every paid plan — Basic, Pro and Enterprise — at no extra charge, exactly like PDF watermarking. It is not available on the Free plan: the protection checkbox is hidden alongside the watermarking toggle until you upgrade.
Frequently asked questions
No. The owner password is yours alone. Customers open the file with no password, print it and copy text from it as usual. Only editing, rearranging pages, commenting and form filling are restricted, and your customers never see or need the password.
No. This configuration deliberately allows copying and printing, so a buyer can quote and print what they paid for. And because the file opens without a password, every restriction is a permission flag that a determined person can remove with the right tool. Treat protection as a deterrent, not a lock.
No. Alva Digital Downloads never shows the password again after you save it, so keep your own copy. You can set a new one at any time: enter it in the Owner password field and save. Customers who already bought the product receive a copy protected with the new password on their next download.
Yes, with the same change watermarking makes. A shared ZIP cannot carry a per-customer watermark or a per-order protected copy, so a ZIP-delivery product's PDFs are watermarked, protected and listed as individual download buttons instead of one archive. Customers still receive every file.
Protected files use 256-bit AES encryption, which needs Adobe Acrobat or Reader X (2010) or newer, or any current reader. Apple Preview, Safari, iOS, Chrome and Firefox all open the file with no password. A reader older than that may report an unsupported encryption error rather than opening the file. Ask the customer to update their reader.
See also
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Last updated 2026-09-02