Flattened PDF With Security Problem

Hi Masi, Are you trying to manipulate the downloaded PDF? Because either Signed Document and Flattened Document are all returned in password SECURED. So if you want to do operations like page extraction or something, you can find an open sourced library helping you to do so. Or alternatively, there's an API allowing you to download image content of your PDF for per page:

GET /api/packages/{packageId}/documents/{documentId}/pages/{pageNumber}

Hope this could help! Duo

Hi Duo, Can you please provide me the difference between a Normal Document And Flattened Document Regards, Masi

Hi Masi, As per previous post has been mentioned: "Active/Normal documents contain the signatures, tamper seal, and audit trails of the signed document. Flattened documents contain no evidence and they are akin to images." Even though flattened documents are similar to images, they are still securied. I've checked the restriction summary, it seems that most flatten PDF created by OSS are not allowed to do page extraction. As Haris suggested in this thread, you can "Remove the security of the pdf using an external library such as iTextSharp (https://community.onespan.com/forum/document-locked)." Duo

@Duo_Liang Related to this thread, the USPTO EFS-Web will only accept PDF files that are either PDF-A or ISO 19005-1 compliant. When trying to use either the Normal document or the Flattened version, since both are password secured, they are not accepted. Is there some way to get a version of the document directly from eSignLive (via the API) that is compliant with the current USPTO EFS-Web standards? Here's a link to their guidelines: https://www.uspto.gov/patents-application-process/applying-online/efs-web-pdf-guidelines Thank you, John

Hi Masi & John, After confirming with our R&D team, "Flattened PDF got Password Protected" was not an expected behavior. This issue was introduced since 11.22 and we're already aware of this. It will be fixed in 11.24 version and you can find the release date in our Trust Center. Duo

@duo_liang Can you please confirm that the "Flattened PDF got Password Protected” was corrected in v11.24 as expected? Based on the releases posted in the Trust Center, I see that the CA instances (prod and sandbox) are both listed to be at 11.26. However, the signed PDF that is supposed to be the flattened version still seems to be password secured. Please confirm that the issue was resolved on the eSignLive/OneSpan side so that we can eliminate that as being the source of the problem. Thank you, John

Hi John, The "Flattened PDF got Password Protected" issue was solved since 11.24, and the flattened documents you downloaded are no longer be password secured. But if your documents still can't pass the validation, I have a question here: when I was reading the "EFS-Web PDF Guidelines", it doesn't mention which version of PDF/A document was required to conform to. (PDF-A 1/2/3) Below are some replies from our Doc Engine team regarding to PDF/A compliance:

OneSpan Sign fully support PDF/2A and PDF/3A. However, PDF/1A is more restrictive so that we don't obey 
all the conformance rules; in this case, we can still sign, render, watermark, etc, but what we apply may not 
obey all of the restrictive conformance rules of a 1A document.
Because we don't maintain PDF/A-1 a+b compliance, it is possible that after such a file is signed that Acrobat
 reports that the file no longer comply with PDF/A-1. For instance, our signature logo contains PDF 'transparency' 
graphic feature but 'transparency' is ruled out explicitly in PDF/A-1 therefore after signing such a pdf file it will no
 longer be PDF/A-1 compliant.
On the other hand 'transparency' is permitted in PDF/A-2 and PDF/A-3.

Is there any way I can upload the files to USPTO EFS-Web so that I can better test the issue for you? Duo

@duo_liang Thank you for replying so quickly. I verified with the development team (actually Masi who is referenced earlier in this thread) that they are using the API to pull the "Flattened" version of the signed PDF... GET /api/packages/{packageId}/documents/{documentId}/pdf?flatten=true We are utilizing the CA sandbox (https://sandbox.e-signlive.ca/) which according to the Trust Center is at v11.26 (https://trust.esignlive.com/trust-center/maintenance-calendar). Checking the properties of the signed PDF file shows that it is still password protected. I have included an attachment showing the security tab and additional details. I would be happy to send you this file if you can provide the details on how I can get it to you directly. Thank you for your help Duo, John

Hi John, Can you send the original document as well as the downloaded flattened document to [email protected]? Duo

@duo_liang No problem at all, files have been sent. Thank you, John