Secure PDF Viewer vs. Traditional PDF Viewer: Which is Better?
As businesses increasingly collaborate and share documents online, security and control over those documents become essential for maintaining the confidentiality of information. This is particularly true for one of the most commonly used file formats, the Portable Document Format (PDF). Therefore, businesses today are confronted with the necessity of choosing between a traditional PDF viewer and a secure PDF viewer.
In this article, we will revisit the traditional PDF viewers, understand the strengths and drawbacks, and explore the benefits of secure PDF viewers like HelpRange provide. We will then weigh the pros and cons and provide an inference on which is better.
Traditional PDF Viewers: Strengths and Drawbacks
Traditional PDF viewers like Adobe Reader are handy tools that offer users the ability to open and navigate PDF documents. They present features like text searching, note taking, zooming, and even some basic editing capabilities. These viewers have been favored for multiple decades for their versatility and free availability.
However, conventional PDF viewers fall short when it comes to security and control. If a confidential document is sent via email without any other sort of protection, there is risk for that information being leaked or hacked. Traditional PDF viewers lack intricate security measures that prevent unauthorized document access, alteration, or deletion.
While most traditional PDF viewers provide features such as password encryption and watermarks, they are often not robust enough to prevent determined data breach attempts. Moreover, once the document leaves the originator's hands, they lose all control and visibility over the document, including the ability to track how the document is being used, who is viewing the document, and if any unauthorized access is taking place.
Additionally, the power to revoke access, set document expiration, or limit the number of views and prints is not available. For businesses dealing with sensitive information, these limitations of traditional PDF viewers may pose substantial security risks.
Secure PDF Viewers: Strengths and Benefits
Stepping into the fray are secure PDF viewers, established to help businesses maintain control over their sensitive documents. Secure PDF viewers go above and beyond to protect the contents of a PDF file, making them a desirable option for businesses that handle confidential documents.
Unlike traditional viewers, secure PDF viewers come with high-level security options that can protect data more comprehensively, providing businesses peace of mind. These options provide the ability to encrypt documents, preventing unauthorized access or tampering. They can also control who has access to each document, and let users track the activity associated with a document, including who opens it and precisely when.
Beyond these standard features, secure PDF viewers have extended abilities. For example, they allow document holders to set expiry dates, limit the number of views, and revoke access at any point in time, even after sharing the document. This flexibility gives companies the control they desire over their sensitive documents.
One such high-level secure PDF viewer is HelpRange. It not only protects your documents but also provides real-time analytics, so you can watch and understand user engagement. It offers features like page-by-page analytics to understand user behavior and engagement level. HelpRange ensures that document holders are not just sharing documents; they are doing so in a secure, controlled, and insightful environment.
The Verdict: Secure PDF Viewer vs. Traditional PDF Viewer
It’s abundantly clear that secure PDF viewers are a step above traditional PDF viewers, particularly where security, control, and analytics are concerned. While the features offered by traditional PDF viewers may be enough for casual document sharing, it doesn’t meet the mark for businesses where data protection and control are critical.
The conclusion of the debate between secure PDF viewers versus traditional ones largely depends on how much sensitive information your business deals with and the control you want over your information. As cybersecurity threats continue to grow in sophistication, so does the need for advanced protection and control.
Secure PDF viewers offer these advanced options, ensuring businesses keep their confidential data safe while staying in command. They provide businesses an evolved PDF tooling option that doesn’t only protect but also learn from document interactions, thereby contributing to business growth and success. So, if security, control, and insight are of primacy to your business, a secure PDF viewer could certainly be the more suitable option.
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HelpRange is "Next-Gen Documents Protection & Analytics Platform". HelpRange represents the cutting-edge platform for document access controls and in-depth analytics, ensuring superior management and usage insights for your documents.