Find password-protected files
Scan sites for locked Office files
A password-protected document cannot be searched or rewritten, which means any find-and-replace over a real tenant has a blind spot. This finds those files and gives you a worksheet to fill the passwords into, so the next replace run can include them.
What it tells you
- Which Office files in the scope are password protected, and where they are.
- How big the blind spot in a replace run actually is.
How it runs
- Sign in and pick a scope. Sites, libraries and folders.
- It scans. Each Office file is checked for encryption. Reading the file is enough; it is never modified.
- Download the worksheet. One row per protected file, with a column for its password.
- Fill it in and bring it back. A Find & Replace run imports the filled worksheet and can then unlock and process those files.
How it works
In SharePoint it lists the files in each ticked site, library or folder and checks only Word, Excel, PowerPoint and PDF files, current and older formats. Instead of downloading each file it reads just the bytes at the start, or for a PDF the start and the end, that show whether the file is encrypted. In a local folder each of those files is read from disk. Nothing is ever written.
An Office file counts as protected when it is stored as an encrypted package rather than an ordinary document. A PDF counts when it is encrypted and does not open with a blank password, so a PDF that only restricts printing or copying is left off the list. In SharePoint, a file that returns no data is counted as not checked and named in the summary, rather than being treated as unprotected.
The result is a worksheet with one row per protected file and an empty password column; the password you put on a row is tried on that file first when a replace run imports the worksheet. The scan is recorded in History with its worksheet, so it can be downloaded again later.
It only detects protection. It never tries a password and never opens a protected file's content.
What you need
- Read access to the libraries in scope. The scan only reads.
What it will not do
- It finds protection. It does not break it. A file whose password nobody knows stays out of reach, and the honest answer is to say so.
- Only encryption is looked for. A rights-managed or information-protected file is not told apart from a password-protected one, and a password will not open it.
- Opening every Office file to check it takes time on a wide scope.