Filter
Top Products
Office 2008 Security
105
Caution
There are no administrative settings that allow you to enforce security preferences that
you specify. Even if you set and deploy security preferences, users can change these
preferences at a later time. Therefore, if you are deploying security settings as part of your
organization's policy, you must educate your users about the risks associated with
changing default settings. Without proper training, users can expose an organization to
unauthorized or malicious use of its data. Establishing a corporate policy for how files are
distributed and handled helps mitigate security vulnerabilities caused by untrained users.
Before you plan and implement a security-enhanced environment, it is important to understand
the different types of security threats. The following sections of this topic list potential security
threats in today’s computing environment. The rest of the Security chapter addresses how to plan
for a secure computing environment and how you can configure the security options in Office
2008 to help address security concerns.
Privacy threats
Many documents contain metadata that should be protected, including text marked as "hidden",
author name, and changes tracked by Office 2008 revision tracking tools. This metadata is useful
because it enables users track document property data. However, in some cases users might not
want to expose the metadata when the document is distributed. By exposing the metadata, users
become vulnerable to privacy threats. Privacy threats include any threat agent that discloses or
reveals personal or private information without the user’s consent or knowledge. Word 2008, Excel
2008, and PowerPoint 2008 allow users to strip out sensitive metadata when the file is saved. With
Entourage 2008, you can use Internet-standard S/MIME security extensions; S/MIME allows users
to digitally sign and encrypt e-mail messages and attachments to help protect them against
tampering or eavesdropping.
For more information about planning and configuring security options that mitigate privacy
threats, see the following topics:
• Configure privacy options in Office 2008
in the Office 2008 Security section
• How users manage digital certificates in Entourage 2008
in the Office 2008 Planning
section