Issues with Protected documents in Word 2007

We are currently seeing some buggy circumstances when dealing with
documents that are protected in Word 2007.

- When a document is protected in Word 2007 and saved as .DOCX and sent
to other users with Word 2007 the document stays protected.

- When a document is protected in Word 2007 and saved as .DOCX and sent
to a user with Word 2003 the document has NO PROTECTION.

- When a document is protected in Word 2007 and saved as .DOC
(Word2003) format and sent to a user with Word 2007 protection can be
removed without a password.

- When a document is protected in Word 2007 and saved as .DOC(Word2003)
format and sent to a user with Word 2003 there is NO PROTECTION.

- When a document is protected in Word 2003 as .DOC format and sent to
any version of Word 2003/2007 it says PROTECTED.

This has been reproducable over and over and is driving our legal
department nuts. Is there a fix for this, something we are doing wrong?
Any help is greatly appreciated.


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LeoReds
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In article <LeoReds.418rzb@DoNotSpam.com>, LeoReds wrote:
> We are currently seeing some buggy circumstances when dealing with
> documents that are protected in Word 2007.
>
> - When a document is protected in Word 2007 and saved as .DOCX and sent
> to other users with Word 2007 the document stays protected.
>
> - When a document is protected in Word 2007 and saved as .DOCX and sent
> to a user with Word 2003 the document has NO PROTECTION.
>
> - When a document is protected in Word 2007 and saved as .DOC
> (Word2003) format and sent to a user with Word 2007 protection can be
> removed without a password.
>
> - When a document is protected in Word 2007 and saved as .DOC(Word2003)
> format and sent to a user with Word 2003 there is NO PROTECTION.
>
> - When a document is protected in Word 2003 as .DOC format and sent to
> any version of Word 2003/2007 it says PROTECTED.
>
> This has been reproducable over and over and is driving our legal
> department nuts. Is there a fix for this, something we are doing wrong?
> Any help is greatly appreciated.

I'd look into MS' Information Rights Management facilities. As near as I
can tell, that's where they expect you to go if you want to protect your
documents. Bug reports re the same sort of thing you're reporting here
seem to be met with an MShrug.

That begs the obvious next question: If they're this cavalier about
breaking existing protection, do you trust them again? Fool me once ....