Fan of e-books. It would be best if you were, but not a fan of, free e-books. Exposing PDF Drive.
People slowly realize the importance of reading books these days. But moreover, they don’t even want to spend a single penny for that knowledge. They want free access to knowledge that can change their entire style of living. Let me quote a beautiful line “Everything has a price, and it’s not the label every time” Here, it may be the label, but you also pay the price of time to go through it. Today we will discuss a free website called pdf drive and conclude on its safety.
Contents
About PDF Drive
Pdf Drive is a free search engine from which you can download millions of pdfs on your device, be it a book, a magazine, or any other kind of readable in the pdf format. It allows you to search, preview, and do the needful without any certification. Pdf-Drive has one of the largest collections of pdfs worldwide, getting it up to the rank. Their crawlers constantly scan the world wide web to add PDF files to their database. Also, for content protection, when a certain PDF or material is withdrawn from the net, it is withdrawn from their database as for their site protection.
All the files on their database have cover photos that save you extra time. Their search engine is high-speed and only takes milliseconds to bring out the results. They also use smart algorithms to give you better results, and the same pdf version of your account can be accessed through your phone or laptop, working in a synchronized manner.
Are PDF books safe?
Before jumping to the conclusion of PDF Drive security, let’s comment on the safety of the pdf books.
Firstly, the pdf files are contaminated with viruses and other malicious executables without a doubt. Now you may be thinking about how it can have a virus and then further contaminate my device? Pdf files are not executable files and can thus not affect your device sitting idle.
How do pdf files contaminate the device?
A pdf document containing multimedia like Saudi, video, or images can be easily corrupted using malware. Hyperlinks inside the pdf are the most dangerous source of malware as those links may lead you to anything not secured. And since you are clicking on the link, it gives the website the authority to use cookies via a very dangerous pdf document. Javascript can be destructive, exploiting the specific PDF reader vulnerabilities to initiate malware.
There are many ways in which the pdf may be contaminated using malware and can further infect your system.
Is PDF Drive safe?
Now PDF Drive has a very nice motive of making available free information to people worldwide. It contains everything from educational materials, legitimately free books, and voluntarily shared files. The problem arises in the voluntarily shared files as a major. Now anybody could add free pdf files contaminated with any malware lurking inside at some point. If the content is truly amazing as of the brief description, the people will be interested in reading that pdf ending up download the file and contaminating their device, which may steal some vital information or personal data as well.
Websites like pdf Drive try their best to keep their sites and content as safe as possible. But the major exposition is that most of their contents are stolen, not checked for copyrights, can even be hijacked, and anyone there can add content for the spread of malware, including cybercriminals. The trojan fake pdf files and malicious scripts can get into any pdf you try to download from these freeware sites.
It is preferable to download the books or materials from qualified sites that allow you to download legally and sometimes for free. I won’t say PDF Drive is completely safe but what makes it dangerous is the facility of its voluntary publishing can turn out to be very dangerous.
Pdf drive tries its best to protect its content and keep its audience intact with them. But few possibilities can change the whole viewpoint.
Is it safe to download free pdfs from the internet.
Internet is a big place both for normal people, good people, and criminals. Not all the sites on the internet are trustworthy. Most of them are the opposite. These kinds of online libraries can become very harmful for you, making your personal info and data prone to hackers.
Sites with too many ads are a major turnover. They cannot be trusted even a single bit. Some sites use strategies like no ads on their first page, and you have to go through ads only for download. This kind of site is the most dangerous compared to any other kind. These ads make you click on few false pop-ups, and then you may end up giving authority to access your device storage or authority permissions. The files downloaded via these links can contain hyperlinks that may destroy your device.
Thus it would help if you prefer physical books instead of these online ebooks. There are many alternatives to these kinds of websites, which we will be discussing in the further component.
Recommended Reading | AhaSlides: One of the Useful Presentation Tool
Important tips and Alternatives to PDF Drive
Getting into tips first:
- Always use antivirus for checking the files. If the file is contaminated, then your antivirus will try to fix the file and then you are safe to go further into reading the file.
- There are sites that check whether your files are ifected with any kind of virus. So you can go through these sites and save yourself from the infection.
- Before downloading any kind of pdf, make sure there is no mistake in the author’s name or the book’s name. This ensures that you are not making any kind of false download.
- Secondly, try to use online cloud readers for reading these files. Dont directly open them in your devices. You can use Google drive or PocketBook Cloud.
- Disable Java Script execution and third party plugins before opening the documetn, if you want to read on your device.
- Dont click any links inside the pdf.
Moving on to some alternatives:
The foremost alternative is the Amazon Kindle or the Kindle e-books. Amazon kindle and its e-books are completely safe for downloads and readers as they are legally qualified, and Amazon being the world’s top company, is very trustable. Try to use online subscriptions for reading this kind of book so that you are fully safe from any virus.
The best free alternative to Pdf Drive is Baen Free Library. It has a lot of e-books with very reasonable pricing and sometimes even for free. It is fully legal, and you can download it from this website without any hesitation. You can access the website here: https://www.baen.com
The third best alternative is Feedbooks. This is a good site that opens through almost all devices, making it very convenient for usage. It too has reasonable prices, and you can access the site here: https://www.feedbooks.com
Now, these were few good alternatives to PDF Drive.
FAQs Related to PDF Drive
Which is the best site to check for viruses in files online?
I personally use MetaDefender Cloud as it checks the availability of viruses for almost 30+ portals.
Is there any free alternative to PDF Drive?
No, there is no safer alternative to PDF Drive. However, an app called Mentors is available on the play store that gives you free summaries of books containing equal knowledge.
Is the mobile app version of PDF Drive safe?
No, it is equally dangerous as compared to the site.
Final Words
Again referring to the safety of PDF Drive, it is not that it is completely unsecured. But the people who publish voluntarily can be hazardous to the innocent audience. It is always preferred to read books in their paperback editions. However, you can use your tech skills and even the antiviruses available in the market to fix and remove the virus and malware. Even the online sites can help you fix the problems, and you are ready to go. Also, don’t forget the tips mentioned in the components above to ensure your safety. Do let us know your thoughts, and till then, CIAO.
