Tweak Library – Apply read-only permission for USB devices.

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Apply read-only permission for USB devices.

Avoid theft of sensitive information using a USB drive by changing access permissions to read-only using this setting.

Tweak for : Windows XP, Windows 2003, Windows Vista

Description:

USB flash drives are portable in size that promotes easy carrying and transferring of data. Pocket-sized and lightweight, USB drives can store your music, images or computer files in a snap. They can be comfortably pinned in/out of the PC and data re-written to it. This can cause a threat to sensitive corporate data.

To avoid theft of sensitive information you can let users read data from a USB drive, but not write data to that drive. This can be incorporated with a simple registry change.

For this, go to Start > Run menu, enter “regedit” and navigate to the registry path listed below. You can create a DWORD value “WriteProtect” in the right panel, if this value does not exist.

Now, right-click and modify its value to “1” which can make USB devices read only. However, if you want to give fill access permission again, change the value data to “0” or delete the added value.

The changes take effect after a restart or logoff.

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Make USB devices read-only.reg

The ".reg" file can make the USB devices read-only.

Download

Dont make USB devices read-only (default).reg

The ".reg" file can give complete access permissions to the USB devices.

Download

Registry Entry Details:

Registry Entry 1 :

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\StorageDevicePolicies\]

Key Type :

Local Machine

Value Name :

WriteProtect

Data Type :

DWORD (DWORD Value)

Enabled Value :

Disabled value :

Other value :

Value Action :

Add an Entry

Steps ScreenShots:

Apply registry settings according below given steps of screenshots with related changes.

Renaming of a folder is not permitted after the rights are set to read-only for USB device.

Write permissions are enabled by default on USB device which allows renaming of a folder.

First, click the 'Start' button, and select 'Run'. In the resulting dialog box, type "regedit".

Second, go to the [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\StorageDevicePolicies\] key, right-click on the blank area in the right pane and click on "New > DWORD Value" to create a new DWORD value with the name "WriteProtect".

Third, right-click on the 'WriteProtect' DWORD value and click on "Modify".

Finally, enter the value "1" in the text box and click on 'OK'.

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