Embedding a font is the technique of bundling a document and the fonts it contains into a file for transmission to another computer. Embedding a font guarantees that a font specified in a transmitted file will be present on the computer receiving the file. Not all fonts can be moved from computer to computer, however, because most fonts are licensed to only one computer at a time. In Windows, only TrueType fonts can be embedded.
Applications should embed a font in a document only when requested by a user. An application cannot be distributed along with documents that contain embedded fonts, nor can an application itself contain an embedded font. Whenever an application distributes a font, in any format, the proprietary rights of the owner of the font must be acknowledged.
It might be a violation of a font vendor's proprietary rights or user license agreement to embed fonts where embedding is not permitted or to fail to observe the following guidelines on embedding fonts. A font's license might allow only read-write permission for a font to be installed and used on the destination computer. Or the license might allow read-only permission. Read-only permission allows a document to be viewed and printed (but not modified) by the destination computer; documents with read-only embedded fonts are themselves read-only. Read-only embedded fonts may not be unbundled from the document and installed on the destination computer.