How to Deny Someone From Forwarding An Email You've Sent Him

General Discussion (off topic) Anything and everyt
#1

Hi Guys,

As the subject denotes, I would like to know whether it’s possible to deny someone from forwarding an email that I’ve sent him myself earlier. In the sense that I have a file in PDF format which I need to attach in this email but since the PDF file contains sensitive data, I need ONLY the intended particular recipients to receive my email; in a way that these same intended recipients won’t be able to forward my email to third parties. Similarly it’s important that the recipients won’t be able to copy this file on their Hard Disk [C:] as then it will be very easy for them to forward the file as a new attachment in a new email.

Just to make it clear, the contents in the email itself are not a problem if they are copied and forwarded; my concern is only the PDF file attached, that is, how I can prevent the file I attached from being distributed to non-intended recipients or to third parties.

The PDF file attached I need to send is already in READ ONLY format and the recipients can’t copy the contents by a simple COPY PASTE but my concern is still the one mentioed above as presently they still can forward my email to third parties.

In this regard, can someone help me out please? Maybe you know of a setting I can do in my email account settings or a software which can help me solve out my problem? Or maybe from Adobe Acrobat Professional itself…

Just to let you know, preferably I’d like to use my GMAIL account to send this email but please feel free if there’s a solution related to other email programs other than Web-based e-mail services like Gmail.

I thank you in advance for any comments and assistance.

Best Regards,

Corolla

#2

its not possible.

imagine this: they can simply take a picture of the monitor when they are viewing it and send that picture to whoever they like.
the problem with digital content (not executables) is that once someone has access to it, they can do whatever they like with it.

Melih

#3

Hi,

I understand your point but the thing is that only the whole document which is much larger than the size of one screen makes sense in my case plus it’s a matter of “hidden” hyperlinked data as well which won’t make sense when making a print screen.

I still guess there must be something in the market…

Thanks a lot.

Corolla

#4

ok np.
the problem is once someone has access they can do whatever they like. Imagine this you have no control of the destination PC, they can view this in their machine as they like, they can reverse engineer it if they wish. Unless you create a special hardware, and ask the recipient to view this (encrypted content) to be viewed in this special viewer hardware (even that is susceptible to a level) then anything else will be very difficult to prove that it will provide the protection you are looking for.
pls let us know what you find though.

thanks
Melih