Exactly how to remove DRM

Preparing

DeDRM works on books for:

• older E-ink Kindles,
• older versions of Kindle for PC or Mac,
• Adobe Digital Editions 2.0.1.

It requires workarounds for:

• E-ink Kindles with firmware later than 5.6.5: Instead of downloading books to the device as normal, instead choose that device for "download & transfer via USB",
• Kindle for PC or Mac later than version 1.26: Disable KFX format downloads,
• Barnes & Noble nookbooks: If you do not already have your key, you will need to manually retrieve it: https://www.aricrenzo.com/2019-12-13-Liberate-Your-Nook-Ebooks/.

It does not work on books from:

• Kindle Fire,
• Kindle for Android or iOS.

1. Setting up your book stores

1a: Kindle for PC or Mac

TODO: The instructions here should possible be merged with those from this forum post: https://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=283371

The forum post contains information on mac installer filenames and more.

First off, you must decide if you want to use the KFX format or not.

• If you want to use the KFX format, you must use Kindle v1.26 or earlier:

  Version 1.26 Exe Archive: https://keybase.pub/koumaza/Archive/kindle-for-pc-1-26-55076.exe

• To disable KFX downloads for Kindle for PC v1.30:

  • Download the lastest version of Kindle from Amazon
  • Install Kindle. The Kindle app will open automatically after installation. Go to Settings and disable automatic updates. Then immediately close it.
  • Go here and download the attached zip file. Unzip it and double click on the cmd file. It will automatically open the Kindle app with KFX download disabled
  • Download any book from the Kindle app. It will be downloaded in the AZW3 format (not the KFX format)

• To disable KFX downloads for Kindle for PC v1.24 or earlier, rename renderer-test as described here. The last PC version in which KFX can be disabled using this method is 1.24.3 (51068).

  (The 1.24 download link is dead. You can use 1.17 instead.)

• To disable KFX downloads for Kindle for PC v1.17, it is not necessary to do anything, as it is disabled by default

  Version 1.17 Exe Archive: https://keybase.pub/koumaza/Archive/kindle-for-pc-1-17-44183.exe

3. Install, launch, and register this Kindle installation with your Amazon account credentials. For some reason, if you use kindle 1.17 you might not be able to login with your credential, if you have this issue, follow the fix in this tread : https://github.com/apprenticeharper/DeDRM_tools/issues/1345

4. Go into Kindle's settings, and disable the auto-update. Otherwise, when you exit the program, it will update to the latest version, which does not work with DeDRM.

1b: Adobe Digital Editions (ADE)

Start ADE and go into the settings and choose "Authorize computer", and sign in with an Adobe ID.

2: Install Calibre

It's preferable to install Calibre and the DeDRM plugin on the same machine (and user) as the book source (Kindle, or Adobe Digital Editions (ADE)), so that DeDRM can automatically retrieve the decryption key. Otherwise you will have to configure the key manually (step 4, see below).

Note: Automatic key extraction on Linux is experimental and might fail.

Go to https://calibre-ebook.com/download for Calibre. Use version 5.x for the current DeDRM plugin (7.x).

3: Install DeDRM Plugin

1. Download Latest Release From: apprenticeharper / DeDRM_tools / releases

   (E.g. DeDRM_tools_{version}.zip)

2. Extract the above zip to find DeDRM_Plugin.zip

3. Install

   1. Open Calibre

   2. Preferences > Plugins > Load plugin from file

   3. Select DeDRM_Plugin.zip (not DeDRM_tools_{version}.zip)

      If this produces an long error message:

      • Check you are using the correct versions, re-read "Install Calibre" above.
      • Check you are selecting the correct zipfile, re-read this section.

   4. Optionally, also install the Obok_Plugin.zip. This handles a different type of DRM.

4: Configure keys

If Calibre is not installed on the machine running Kindle or ADE, you will need to provide the dencryption keys manually. Open the configuration interface from Calibre: Preferences > Plugins > (Find the DeDRM plugin by searching; use Show only user installed plugins) > Customize Plugins.

If you are using Linux, Calibre will try to extract the keys from your Wine environment; if you have installed Kindle or ADE there, it should be able to find it. If you do end up having many Wine environments (WINEPREFIXes) on your computer, you still need to go into the key configuration dialogs for Kindle and ADE and provide the exact WINEPREFIX where you have installed the software.

If you are seeing an Unable to find python3 executable in WINEPREFIX error message, it means you need to install Python3 for Windows in that WINEPREFIX.

The tools for extracting keys are found in the Other_Tools/DRM_Key_Scripts directory in the source code. You will need to download the source code tar gz or zip from the release page mentioned above. Alternatively, you can download individual files on the GitHub webpage using the "Raw" button.

Open the scripts with a plain text editor to see instructions on how to use them. The plugin's built-in help link will also give you some ideas.

Removing DRM

1. Getting the files

1a. From Kindle

• Launch Kindle for PC/Mac & login.
• Download the book from which you want to remove DRM (Use Right-Click). It will be downloaded to C:\Users\username\Documents\My Kindle Content\***\***.azw

1b: From Adobe Digital Editions (ADE)

• Open the ACSM file in ADE, to get the Adobe DRM PDF/EPUB.
• Right click the book to show it in the file explorer.

2. Import the book into Calibre

Just use any of the UI methods to import the book: Drag-and-drop, the import wizard, etc.

Important: DRM is removed when importing books to Calibre, not when converting to other formats.

3. This is the end of the process. Good job on your hard work & enjoy your book.

With reference to

1. From @ElleKayEm https://github.com/apprenticeharper/DeDRM_tools/issues/1328#issuecomment-712930550