Information technologies have so rapidly rushed into the life of a modern person and at the same time have firmly taken root that many simply cannot do without a personal computer at this moment. It should be noted that, in fulfilling their professional duties, some have to share PCs with their colleagues, and in this regard, there is an urgent need to protect confidential information. Parents are also willing to protect important documents from accidental deletion when their children have access to a computer. Trying to not only significantly restrict, but completely deny access to the materials, it is useful to study the information on how to put a password on a folder.

In Windows, you can install protection only on selected directories with important information.

Archiving protection

Having set out to find information on how to put a password on a folder using the software resources provided by the OS, you can spend a lot of time searching, but everything will fail because the developers have not provided for this protection option. In this regard, you have to look for alternative ways to put a password on a folder. One of such methods is archiving followed by setting a password.

Archiving materials

The operating system installed on each computer stores a sufficient number of useful programs that the user successfully uses, but does not always know about their additional features.

One of such programs is WinRAR archiver, which allows you to unzip the downloaded archives or, conversely, to pack information in case of need. However, only a minimal number of users know that WinRAR allows you to safely set passwords, thereby preventing unauthorized entry to a folder.

Of course, having read the information on how to put a password on a folder, you will later have to work not just with materials, but with an archive, but in this case you can be sure that the information will not be destroyed and no outsider will have access to it.

So, in order to put a password, the user hovers the mouse over the desired folder and right-clicks the mouse, calling the context menu. In it, select “Add to archive”, after which a new context menu appears in which you can select a number of sentences that fit individual requests, as well as assign a name to the archive. Going to the Advanced tab, the user will find the Set Password option.

At this stage, even a beginner will understand how to set a password for a folder, because by pressing the above button, it remains only to enter the invented combination of numbers and letters twice.

Now turning on the computer, everyone will be able to open and view any files, except for the created archive. In order to gain access to the files included in the archive, you will need to enter a password.

Protection of materials using programs

Some users do not welcome the use of archives, so they are looking for other options on how to put a folder under a password. Most users want to install additional software on their computer to solve this problem. Reject archives for the reason that when you save may fail, due to which some of the information will be lost.

DirLock features

Since the developers of the operating system did not take care of setting a password for the collected materials, programmers actively tackled this problem by offering software with which it is easy to understand how to set a password for a folder, and it is also easy to accomplish all this.

In particular, there is a program for setting a password on a folder. The name of this program is DirLock.

The program is fairly easy to install, so the beginner is not even experiencing problems installing it. It is only important to download it to your computer from a trusted source in order not to download virus-infected files.

After the program is installed, the “Lock / UnLock” submenu will appear in the context menu. Only in some cases in the context menu this submenu is not immediately displayed. To fix the situation, you should launch DirLock, go to the “File” tab, then “Options” and click on the “Add 'Lock / Unlock' context menu” button. Now the “Lock / UnLock” will be displayed in the context menu.

The program will each time offer to enter a password to provide access to the desired folder. Unfortunately, each time the user will have to remove the protection, and upon completion of working with the folder, reinstall it.

Anvide Lock Folder features

DirLock is not the only solution to how to put a password on a folder in your computer. Along with it, there is another very interesting program Anvide Lock Folder, which also allows you to restrict access to materials using the protection installation.

Installing the Anvide Lock Folder program is also quite simple. A great advantage is that the program is Russified, so it’s easy to understand its capabilities. And even without having the instructions at hand, the user can easily understand how to put the folder under the password.

Initially, you should launch Anvide Lock Folder, then click on the plus icon, and then indicate the path to the materials on which you want to install additional protection. Select the desired folder with the mouse, you should click on the icon depicting a closed lock. The program itself prompts you to enter a security combination, consisting of numbers and letters, twice, after which you will be asked to enter a hint. If there is no desire to enter a hint, you can reject the program offer. Now the materials will be unavailable for all PC users.

To gain access to them, you will have to restart Anvide Lock Folder, do the same manipulations, but just click on the icon depicting an open lock, and then enter the installed security combination.

Password Protect Features

Another interesting program is Password Protect, which does not need to be pre-installed on your computer. It is quite enough to just download and immediately start using.

After specifying the original path to the materials, they hover the mouse over the folder itself, then click the "Lock folders" button and enter the twice-invented security combination.

As a result, the materials will not only be protected, but also transferred to the status of hidden, so it will be difficult for an uninitiated user to even find them.

Removing the protective combination occurs in a similar pattern, after which the materials become available for viewing and editing.

There are several ways to set a password for important materials. Each user must determine the option that will be clear and comfortable for him to use. It is important that only those who know the password can use the materials.