How to encrypt access to a folder on a computer. How to set a password for a Windows folder: The best encryption programs

Today, I want to raise a topical question for many PC users: how to put a password on a folder or file to protect it from unauthorized opening. This simple procedure will help limit access to personal information that you want to keep secret from other people.

The operating system itself does not provide the ability create passwords to open files and folders. Therefore, you will have to install additional software (programs) for this. You can go in two ways - which can be opened only after entering a password, or use special programs.

How to put a password on a folder using archiving?

Let's look at the first option first. So, we need to archive the selected folder. To do this, click on its name right click mice. A menu will appear in which you should select “Add to archive”:

The archiving menu will open. Go to the “Advanced” tab and click on the “Set Password” button.

A window will appear. In it, you must enter the combination of numbers and letters chosen for the password twice. After that, click “OK”. It would also be a good idea to check the “Encrypt file names” checkbox. This will ensure the maximum level of information protection.

That's it, the archive with the password has been created. You can check. Try opening a classified folder. As soon as you try to do this, a window will appear requiring you to enter a password:

How to put a password on a folder or file using the program?

Now let's move on to special programs that will help us put a password on a folder or file. There are quite a lot of them. Some of them are paid, but you can find many online. The principle of operation of such programs is almost the same, the menu is also similar. I suggest you consider one of the most convenient ones - Password Protect, you can find and download it in Yandex or Google without any problems.

To make it possible to open a folder or file only after entering a password, first launch the program. A window will appear asking you to purchase this software. But this is not necessary, so click the “Run Trial Version” button:

A window will open in which, first, click the “Lock folders” button.

A list of all files and folders that exist on the computer will appear. We look in this list for the object that we want to “password” and click “OK”:

Now you need to come up with a password and enter it in the window that opens. Enter the invented combination of numbers and letters twice, press the “Lock folders” button. Also in this window you can write a short explanation of the password, which will help you decrypt it in the future if for some reason the code is forgotten or lost. If you want to take advantage of this opportunity, check the box next to “Hint” and in the next line enter information that will help remember your password. But this is not at all necessary.

After clicking on the “Lock folders” button, on the . This will be reported in the window that opens:

That's it, the program has done its job. Now you can open the folder only after entering the selected password. Let's check: is everything okay? Try to open the folder - a window appears in which you must enter a password:

I hope the question how to put a password on a folder or your file has disappeared, because it’s not at all difficult.

Finally, I would like to advise you to select more complex combinations characters, which will include both numbers and letters. This password is difficult to guess. But the combination should be easy to remember, so that you can easily remember it later. But write down passwords not worth it. Where is the guarantee that no one will find your records with passwords?

Good luck to you. Let everything be the most personal and valuable information will be maximally protected from the prying eyes of others!

Quite often, everyone in the household uses a computer and there is a need to hide certain information in a folder from prying eyes. There is a stereotype that it is difficult to do this. But with a little effort, in just a couple of minutes you can put a password on a folder or file.

To this day, the Windows operating system does not have the ability to hide information in folders and files. Microsoft provides the ability to restrict access to certain users. But the computer can be used by several people and this option is not entirely convenient.

You can find and install the program on the Internet. You just have to spend a lot of time studying the nuances of its work. In this case, the WinRar archiver will come in handy. As a rule, it is installed on almost every computer. It’s hard to work without an archiver, and sooner or later you’ll have to download it.

To set a password using the WinRar archiver you need to:

1. Right-click on the folder or file to which you want to close access. Then select “Add to archive” in the context menu that appears.

2. Opens small window, where the parameters are set. Click on the “Set password” button. To do this, you need to set them in the “Advanced” tab by clicking on “Set password”.

3. After this, a window will open where you will need to enter the desired password and confirm it. You can also choose here additional options: Display the password as you type (the characters you enter will be shown) and encrypt file names (file names will be in the form of asterisks, additional protection).

4. The password is set to archive. An asterisk next to a file means it is password protected. You can add any file or folder to the created archive by first entering a password.

5. When opening the archive, a window will appear asking you to enter a password.

Files archived with WinRar archiver open without problems.

Let's figure out how to put a password on a folder using free program Dirlock. This is a fairly simple way to protect personal data. Download and install the program ().

After this, just right-click on the folder that we want to protect with a password and select “Lock/UnLock”.

In the next window, enter the password for the folder 2 times and press the “Lock” button. If you check the box next to “Hide”, the folder will become hidden. You can find it in the folder with installed program C:\Program Files\dirLock\. To open a folder, you need to click on the folder and select “Lock/UnLock” again, and then enter the password.

I would like to note that the program does not work correctly in at least I have.

Developers release thousands every day different programs. So in the sphere software Password Protect USB appeared. It is distributed free of charge and finding it will not be a problem.

After downloading the program, you need to install it. In order to put a password on a folder using Password Protect USB, you will need to perform a number of simple steps:

1. Launch the program and click Lock Folders. Next, a window will appear in which you need to specify let to the folder. These actions can be done in just a few clicks: right-click on the folder and select Lock with Password Protect USB from the context menu that appears.

2. A small window will open where you need to create a password and enter it for confirmation. Click Lock Folder.

3. A message will appear that the folder is password protected, and there will be a red icon on the folder itself. If one of the users tries to open it, he will see a window where he must enter a password.

Having installed password protection folder, you can transfer various documents to it. Access to them will be closed.

Using Password Protect USB, it is possible to set a password for folders that are located both on the computer and on flash drives.

The program allows you to perform similar actions Anvid Lock Folder. You need to launch it and click on the big plus sign. Then we find in the list required folder and click “Ok”. A folder will appear in the program window indicating its location. To set a password, you must first select it, and then click on the lock and enter the password. Anvide Lock Folder differs from similar software in that it provides a password reminder function. The folder can only be accessed through the program.

Hello, dear readers of the blog site. For some reason, there are no built-in tools in Windows that would allow you to block access to a folder for those who do not know the password to access it.

At the same time, this is exactly what comes to mind for any user of this operating system. the simplest way save some of your data in confidential form - just put a password on the folder where the “hidden” documents (files or other directories) will be stored.

Well, really, what could be more logical than to password-protect access to a certain directory and put there everything that you would like to protect from prying eyes (spouse, children, hackers, competent authorities, etc.). There may be many goals, but the solution seems obvious - make a kind of safe out of any folder, the code for which only you will know (and how to come up with it, read the article).

How to set a password for a folder after archiving it

However simple options solutions to this problem (built into Windows means) still no. More precisely, there are a number of methods that do not guarantee any confidentiality, but only provide “fool protection”. It doesn't make much sense to rely on them. In this same publication I want to focus on a way to make a safe of the highest security category from any catalog, but for this you will have to install an additional program in the OS.

It was originally built on open source and a priori () did not contain bookmarks that would allow developers to access your password-protected data. Unfortunately, the developers have now sold themselves to BitLocker, whose products already come with closed code, which means your password folders, if desired, can be opened using backdoors. However, TrueCrypt can still be found and used for your purposes.

But first, I’ll give you something easier to use, but less reliable way(competent authorities and specialists will be able to hack the directory, but your relatives and friends will not). It lies in the fact that the necessary the folder can be archived with a password, so that a person who does not know it would no longer be able to carry out the unzipping process.

You are all probably very familiar with archivers. Among them there are both paid and free versions. But in addition to its main functionality - creating archives to save disk space and speed up data transfer over the Internet, modern archivers allow you to encrypt archived data and protect it with passwords. It is this opportunity that we will take advantage of.

Let's try to archive a folder and set a password for it first using an example free archiver(7-Zip), and then using the example of a paid one (WinRAR), which, however, is installed on almost all computers. I think that you have at least one of them, and if not, you can always install them by going to the official websites of the developers of these programs ().

How to archive and password protect a directory in 7-Zip

So, if you have it installed in Windows archiver 7-Zip, then in order to archive any folder (or a set of files and directories) in it, it will be enough to right-click on it and select from the drop-down context menu items “7-Zip” - “Add to archive”:

As a result, you will see the archiving settings window, where, among other settings, you can set a password to access this archive, or rather, encrypt the entire contents of the folder (while archiving it), and this code will be the key to decryption.

A feature of “archiving with a password” of directories via 7-Zip is that you can enter the created archive (folder) without entering a password, and when you try to open any file you will be required to enter it:

If you want to password-protect access not only to the files in this directory, but also prohibit viewing the contents of this folder without entering a password, then simply check the “Encrypt file names” box in the archiving settings window (second screenshot from here). After this, when you try to view the contents of the archive, a prompt to enter a password will pop up.

How to set a password when archiving a folder in WinRAR

You can also use the capabilities of the second of the archivers mentioned above to simultaneously archive and password protect a folder - WinRAR. As I already mentioned, it’s paid, but for some reason in RuNet they don’t really take it into account.

If WinRAR is in your Windows already installed, then simply right-click on the directory for which you want to set a password and select “Add to archive” from the context menu:

In the window that opens, go to the “Advanced” tab and click on the “Set password” button:

Here you will be asked to create and enter a password, which will become the key to your archived folder, and you can also check the “Encrypt file names” box so that no one can view the contents of the archive without entering the password (we already talked about this a little higher):

After that, click OK twice and try to enter the created archive using the password you created. If everything worked out, then you can delete the original folder, the contents of which need to be hidden from prying eyes. And as needed, you will simply log into this archived and password-protected folder. It's a little stressful to have to enter your password all the time, but security requires sacrifice. IMHO ()

How to put a strong password on a folder using TrueCrypt

As I mentioned just above, there is various programs, which make it possible to implement such an obvious Windows users The idea is to block access to the folder using a password. There are quite a lot of such programs (for example, Folder Lock, DirLock, Anvide Lock Folder, File lock, Lim LockFolder etc.), but a user who understands computers will most likely be able to bypass them. Therefore, if you want to hide something from your household or work colleagues on your computer, then they will suit you just fine.

But often something more radical is required, when hacking a password-protected folder will require monstrous efforts And computing power, which will naturally deter most potential burglars. This type of tool includes the TrueCrypt program, which allows you to set a password not only for a directory, but even for the entire computer (to completely encrypt system partition, if you need it).

I have already written in some detail about working with her:

Unfortunately, today the developers no longer release new versions of the program, because they switched to working with BitLocker (Microsoft), but you can download TrueCrypt one of the latest versions via this link. In any case, it works great for me.

Let me explain a little what “put a password on a folder” means in TrueCrypt, because this is somewhat different from the options discussed above. In this program, you create a container from any file that is on your computer and has just been created.

It will be very difficult to discover that it is a container for something, and besides, inside this container (actually a folder with files and other directories) you can create a hidden container, which certainly no one will guess about. Hackers very actively use this program to hide, for example, their correspondence, because it is difficult to even find corrupted (encrypted) information, not to mention hacking it.

So, this very container is encrypted and decrypted on the fly (you won’t even notice it) and you can work with it like a regular directory (even more like a portable hard drive or a flash drive, because this password-protected folder is connected in Windows exactly as new virtual disk).

That. you can copy something there, delete it, move it standard means operating system (via Explorer or, for example, Total Commander).

At the end of the work, you simply unmount the virtual disk, and no one (who does not know the password) will be able to access your data. Wonderful thing.

For all the details of working with TrueCrypt for setting passwords on a flash drive, folder, or even the entire computer, see the links given just above. And remember that absolute protection does not exist (you can provide the password yourself under pressure), but among all other methods of data protection, this program is one of the most optimal options. IMHO.

Good luck to you! See you soon on the pages of the blog site

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Set a password for a folder

There is one program called Password Protect USB, so with the help of it it’s very easy to put a password on a folder and you won’t need to mess around with any archives. She copes with her main task quite well.

Find this program, download, install and run.

If you have a Russified version like me, then you will need to click on the Block button (in English version Lock Folders).

In the window that opens, specify the folder for which you want to set a password.

There on the FreeWare tab you can download latest version utilities. Please note that it is second in the list of programs.

Only the essence of her work is a little different. IN in this case The password is set not for files and folders, but for the program itself. And the data we need simply becomes invisible to prying eyes. In general, read on, as it will be easier to explain with an example.

Download, install and open WinMend Folder Hidden

When we first start it, we are immediately asked to set a password for the program. Enter it twice and save.

Now you can work.

Using the “Hide folder” or “Hide file” button, indicate where on the computer the data is located that should not be visible to anyone. Thus, by specifying the directories in the main window we will see everything hidden files and folders.

Great. Now no one will be able to gain access to this information, since it is simply not visible. And if you need to work with data, then launch the program and enter the master password.

Select the folders you need and click the “Show” button.

The position will be changed to Visible.

We worked with the files (folders) and again change the status to “Hide" and close the program.

I think this information will be enough for you to successfully put a password on a folder or file. And if you know any other similar programs, then please share the names in the comments.

P.S. Finally, I would like to say that set password on specific folders will remain in effect until you uninstall the program itself. So be careful!

Manufacturers operating systems are seriously concerned about the security of user data, and Microsoft company from among them. Many large corporations use Windows system, which becomes more and more reliable with new versions. Despite this, it does not provide a function for setting a password on separate folder or file. Microsoft explains the absence of such an opportunity by the presence of an option to activate a password for an individual computer user, but this is not always convenient.

A common situation is when an employee in the office leaves the computer for a couple of minutes to make coffee or talk on the phone. At this moment he personal files are not protected if he has not logged out of his profile. Anyone can not only view files on a computer, but also download them, which is fraught with problems. However, there are several ways that allow you to put a password on a folder in Windows any versions, either using or not using third-party programs.

We recommend reading:

How to put a password on a folder in Windows without programs?

The method that will be described below does not provide full protection data in the folder from the actions of intruders.

cls @ECHO OFF title Folder Private if EXIST "Compconfig Locker" goto UNLOCK if NOT EXIST Private goto MDLOCKER :CONFIRM echo Are you sure you want to lock the folder(Y/N) set/p "cho=>" if %cho%==Y goto LOCK if %cho%==y goto LOCK if %cho%==n goto END if %cho%==N goto END echo Invalid choice. goto CONFIRM :LOCK ren Private "Compconfig Locker" attrib +h +s "Compconfig Locker" echo Folder locked goto End :UNLOCK echo Enter password to unlock folder set/p "pass=>" if NOT %pass%== PASSWORD_GOES_HERE goto FAIL attrib -h -s "Compconfig Locker" ren "Compconfig Locker" Private echo Folder Unlocked successfully goto End :FAIL echo Invalid password goto end :MDLOCKER md Private echo Private created successfully goto End :End

This code is a script that will allow you to put a password on a folder in Windows without programs.

Statistics show that many people are careless about their passwords, choosing secret code your date of birth or your name. OkeyGeek site advises you to be more careful when choosing a password, in particular, adding letters of different case, punctuation marks and numbers to it, which allows you to confuse programs for automatic password selection.

Attention: This file will remain visible to users, and through it they will need to access the personal folder on which the password is set. We recommend choosing a name for the file that would “repel” intruders. For example, the file can be named " Win.bat" or " splwow64.bat».

As we said above, this method not ideal, and experienced users Computers that want to access your folder will not be saved by setting a password in this way.

How to find out the password set on a Windows folder?

If you know which file is responsible for hiding/opening a private folder on the computer, then it’s quite easy to find out the password that triggers the script. You don't need any specialized tools or programs for this.

The password can be obtained as follows:

It seems like you only need to do 2 steps to open a folder with a password, and that's true. But for an ordinary user, a child or a person who understands practically nothing about the principles of computer operation, it will be difficult to figure out how to open a folder hidden under a password.