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Limiting the ability of creating a new digital ID

Forum Index > Security > Limiting the ability of creating a new digital ID
2011-10-18 13:24:54
ecburris
Registered: Nov 11 2008
Posts: 15
Answered

Several of us use Acrobat Pro and note that we have the ability to create a digital ID using another's name and email address. By doing so it appears this person signed the document, it even indicates it's valid.
 
Is there a way to limit the ability of users creating digital IDs?

My Product Information:
Acrobat Pro Extended 9.0, Windows
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2011-10-18 14:03:37
#1
George_Johnson
Expert
Registered: Jul 6 2008
Posts: 1875
Accepted Answer
With self-signed certificates, you decide which ones to trust. Only trust ones where you can confirm the source. Only consider signatures as being valid if you've chosen to trust the corresponding identity. A signature won't show as fully validated unless you do. The signer's identity will then show as valid when the signature is validated.
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2011-10-18 14:36:36
#2
ecburris
Registered: Nov 11 2008
Posts: 15
George,

Okay, thank you; however, if the person forging the document with a fake ID prints the document there is no way to verify if the signature is valid; is that correct?

Earl
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2011-10-20 01:40:32
#3
smadwin
Expert
Registered: Jul 10 2009
Posts: 40
Hi Earl,

Yes it can be done. To reiterate what George said, and one of my favorite expressions is, "trust is everything". Once you give away trust you give away everything. It really becomes a social engineering issue at this point. The object for the bad guy is to get the document recipient to trust the signer. This is why in the PKI universe a Certificate Authorities is also known as a trusted 3rd party because they vette the identity of a person before they issue the digital ID.

Steve

Steven Madwin
Software QA Engineer
Adobe Systems Incorporated
345 Park Avenue, MS-W15
San Jose, CA 95110-2704 USA
408.536.4343 p, 408.537.4053 f
Steven [dot] Madwin [at] adobe [dot] com

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2011-10-31 15:47:20
#4
ecburris
Registered: Nov 11 2008
Posts: 15
Thanks Steve
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2011-11-08 07:24:46
#5
Peter A
Registered: Nov 8 2011
Posts: 1
If I select Security in Acrobat 7 I get

An error occurred retrieving policies.

Unknown error
Support Information: SecPolicy-722

How can I remove the problem policy please. I do not know where to find the stored policies.

Thanks

Peter A
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