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Which locking mechanism is used for Password-protect function of Pages app?

In this article (https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT207595), I can see that exporting to PDF uses AES-128 which is a baseline good sign, however nowhere has a detail of its normal document password protection using which algorithm.


Does simply password-protecting and saving it as .pages file still encrypt the file in AES-128 or 258?

Posted on Oct 31, 2021 3:15 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Oct 31, 2021 5:20 AM

That March 2017 article indicates that Apple upgraded the PDF export security to AES-128. Some PDF Editors also standardize on AES-128 for encryption because even though they may offer AES-256, that level of additional encryption poses portability issues to applications that only expect AES-128.


Apple's product teams do not participate in these public, user-supported communities, and other than that linked document advising of the AES-128 PDF password security upgrade, Apple is not going to divulge any internal security craft about how they set that password.


For more reading, see Advanced Security Standard.

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Oct 31, 2021 5:20 AM in response to Tunacant

That March 2017 article indicates that Apple upgraded the PDF export security to AES-128. Some PDF Editors also standardize on AES-128 for encryption because even though they may offer AES-256, that level of additional encryption poses portability issues to applications that only expect AES-128.


Apple's product teams do not participate in these public, user-supported communities, and other than that linked document advising of the AES-128 PDF password security upgrade, Apple is not going to divulge any internal security craft about how they set that password.


For more reading, see Advanced Security Standard.

Which locking mechanism is used for Password-protect function of Pages app?

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