We have a very specific use case for an application we're developing, where a user will be presented with a PDF document, which they can print off. However, we need to be able to restrict the PDF so it can only be printed off once. Does anyone know if there's a way to restrict the number of times a PDF can be printed.
I'm aware the PDF spec has lots of security features, but I've not found reference to anything like this before.
Answer
Adobe use their Adobe Content Server to protect eBooks and PDFs along with Adobe Digital Editions (their free eBook and PDF reader) on the client side. This allows the distribution of PDFs with more flexible security options than the usual standalone PDF will allow. For example, documents can be time limited or allow only a certain number of pages to be printed.
This may well be a sledgehammer solution to your problem as I've no idea of Adobe's pricing for this product or whether is's practical for a small number of documents. It's used by the likes of the British Library (until recently anyway) for electronic inter-library loans which expire after 2 weeks and only allow the article to be printed once.
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