How to Lock a Thumb Drive to Be Read Only.

There are two means to make a USB stick read only. 1 method will brand the USB read-only in annihilation it is connected to, so yous could say this is a universal way of making a flash drive write protected.

The other mode is a PC specific solution where some registry edits are required to any computer the USB flash bulldoze is connected to.

When nosotros say 100% permanent, this ways the USB stick is read but (write protected) on all devices, whether it exist computers like a Mac, Windows PC, Linux box or not-processor based products like a car stereo. This permanent solution also ways the status of the drive cannot be changed. The other method flags a USB device to be read but in relationship to the PC it is connected to and then that whenever that USB stick is continued to that computer, it makes the USB read only and blocks all write commands to the device.

Almost times an It manager or content owner wants the USB stick to be read but so the files cannot be deleted or formatted off the drive. Another reason for making a USB read only is for the original files to remain the same and blocks the ability for files to be inverse or manipulated. Finally, it's smart to accept USBs read only then that virus' don't jump onto the drive and perhaps spread to other computers.

Let us start with the less permanent fashion considering it's easier to practice and doesn't require any specific hardware.

You will demand a Windows7 machine or college. The Windows7 machine will have DiskPart utility which allows us to perform all sorts of cool things to flash drives, similar setting write protection.

• Connect the USB to your Windows computer.
• To begin, go to your Windows Get-go and in the Search Field blazon cmd

This volition run your Command prompt.

• Next, you will desire to get to the C root of the Command prompt and if you are signed in as a user you lot tin can simply type cd\ this volition become y'all back to the root of the C bulldoze.
• Blazon DISKPART
• Blazon LIST DISK

At present you lot volition need to detect the USB stick connected to your PC. Well-nigh likely it's DISK ane

• We must select the device we want to change the attributes for, so type SELECT DISK 1
• To gear up the drive every bit read only, type ATTRIBUTES DISK SET READONLY
• DiskPart will ostend the attribute was sent and yous tin can now type “EXIT

And then what nosotros did is make a registry entry in that Windows machine to always treat that flash drive as read only. Every bit you can see this is a unproblematic solution that is PC specific. In addition, if you get a registry cleaning tool like “USB Scrub” that utility will remove the registry entry we just made and the User can once over again practise annihilation they want to the drive.

Some other squeamish and easy office to make a file more permanent is to gear up a file as Read Only. When a file on the USB stick is set to Read Merely information technology blocks the User from deleting or formatting the drive. Notwithstanding, this simply works on the PC so if the USB is put into a Mac or Linux box, they can do whatever.

Another easy way to brand a USB drive Read Only is formatting the drive as NTFS. This is not recommended because the NTFS file system is what we call a 'dynamic file system' and is always changing. Meaning, the User volition demand to Squirt the drive, not just yank it out of the USB socket. If you decide to format equally NTFS merely alter permissions and so that All Users have merely Read Access. The work around is a User modifying the permissions by Taking Ownership and setting Total Access over again.

So what about those USB drives that are permanently read only? No matter what yous exercise, on which reckoner, you cannot remove the read only setting? The respond is this: The read simply setting was done at the controller level.

What this ways specifically is the USB controller chip on the flash drive 'controls' what happens to the data on the flash retention. 1 feature the controller can perform is to block the SCSI write control to the NAND retentivity. This is what makes the USB stick read merely. The write command is blocked at the controller level. This means the setting is inside the USB stick itself and is not dependent on the PC telling the User what information technology can and cannot exercise, simply rather the device itself is telling the figurer what it can and cannot practice.

Unfortunately there is a very big number of USB controller manufacturers which all use their own set of commands to block the SCSI write command. With that said, at that place is no universal solution to prepare the read just attribute to all USB flash drives!

There is hope!

If you are reading this post you are probably trying to figure out how to make a set of flash drives read only for distribution or deployment them to a grouping of employees. You might even be looking for a style to turn on and off the write protection so you tin can remotely update software or installation files while keeping the drive read only the entire time. Wouldn't that exist nice!

A vendor out there as a very slick solution. They offering the USB drives with the ability to turn on and off the read only setting through either a command line tool, so you lot can do it within your ain application, or through a GUI (Graphical User Interface). The control line option means through your ain software y'all tin can plan when to unlock and lock the USB drive! This is an platonic solution for those who need to deploy USB sticks equally read only devices, still notwithstanding want the power to update the bulldoze, remotely, without the user having to exercise anything. The command line tool is designed for whatever exe file to call out the correct code to lock or unlock the drive and practice this at the exact time and identify your exe file wants to.

If you are non a programmer and want to turn on and off the read only setting with a click of a button through a GUI, at that place is also free software which comes with the drives to make those settings: meet beneath.

Nexcopy offers the drives in both USB ii.0 and USB 3.0 configurations and the capacity will range from the smaller 2GB drives to the very large 32GB+ sizes.

We found the Nexcopy website through this website: www.usbcopier.com which does a slap-up job explaining USB read only, USB CD-ROM partitions and more than.

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Source: https://www.getusb.info/how-to-make-a-usb-read-only/