When you save an Office 2007 file, it’s easy to forget that you may need to apply some protection to it; in fact, you may not even thing about it (or know you can). But there are options for protecting the files you share with others. By setting protections on a file, you can specifically state what others who have access to it can do.
In Word 2007, click the Review tab. [See Image 1]. Then, click the arrow under Protect Document. [See Image 2]. Finally, select Restricted Access. You’ll be asked to verify you have a “certificate”, and you will likely have
to work through a short process to sign up for one. Once that’s complete, you can type the names of those who can read or change the document. [See Image 3]. Once the document is protected, the notice shown here will appear in the interface to notify users it is protected. [See Image 4]
In Excel 2007, things work a little differently. As with Word, you’ll select the Review tab. Once selected, you’ll see two options: Protect Sheet and Protect Workbook. Make the choice appropriate for your Excel sheet or workbook.
PowerPoint 2007 works quite differently, because there’s no Review tab. Instead, you select the Save As option, click Tools, then click General Options. The two protection options are: Password to Open and Password to Modify. You can assign one or both; however, if you use both make sure to give each one a different password.