How to Make USB Drives Read Only


If you want to prevent information on your computer from leaking out but need the ability to read data from a USB drive. This method will prevent write access on your computer’s USB ports. This can be easily done with a registry key.
1. Click Start >  Run > Type regedit, and then press Enter.
2. Navigate to following registry key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control
Regedit

4. Right click on control, navigate to new and create new key, Change the name asStorageDevicePolicies

Create_ Key_StorageDevicePolicies

5. Right click on it, navigate to new DWORD and name it as WriteProtect
6. Right click on it, modify 0 as 1 in the value
7. Quit Registry Editor.
The USB ports on your computer are now read only.
To make them capable of writing data again, change the value of the WriteProtect key to 0.
1. Click Start, and then click Run.
2. In the Open box, type regedit, and then click OK.
3. Navigate to following registry key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\StorageDevicePolicies
4. In the right pane, double-click “WriteProtect”.
5. In the Value data box, enter 0, and then click OK.
6. Quit Registry Editor.
Hope this helps……

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