# Protecting a file from being copied.



## crazyone (Feb 3, 2008)

I am looking to put a file/program on a hard drive and prevent it from being copied to a cd. Any help would be greatly appreciated.


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## peterh40 (Apr 15, 2007)

You could do two things:

1. Set the hidden flag.
2. In the Security tab, set Users to have Deny rights for 'Read' rights, (leave it Allow for yourself and just un-tick for other types of users).


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## crazyone (Feb 3, 2008)

Little new at this so would you please explain those 2 processes. I greatly appreciate your help.


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## calvin-c (May 17, 2006)

1) Setting the hidden flag only protects the file against users who don't select 'show hidden files'. These are typically novice users who wouldn't think to copy the file to CD in the first place.
2) Denying Read rights for other users will prevent them from running the program. If this is your intent (i.e. installing a program for your use only) then this should work-otherwise, it won't.

Is this specifically aimed at copying to CD or copying the file in general? Either way, I don't know of any way to install a program for general use & prevent it from being copied. You can protect it so that the copy won't work, but I don't know of any way to really prevent it from being copied except, as peter suggested, restricting it so only you can use it.


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## crazyone (Feb 3, 2008)

How would I protect it so the copy would not work. I want to put this information on the computer and allow all users to have access. The only restriction I want is to not allow anyone to make a usable copy if possible. I am considering placing dummy files in the program to make it to large to fit on cd, but I am certainly open to suggestions. I genuinely appreciate any help or suggestions.


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## Squashman (Apr 4, 2003)

If a person has read accesss, you basically cannot stop them from making a copy of it on to some other media.


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## TheRobatron (Oct 25, 2007)

As long as someone can read the file, you can't stop them from copying it. You could try putting a file in another directory and making the program check for it (and if it's not there i.e. it is on its own on a CD the program wouldn't work). That should deter most novices, but it's not exactly secure because people would work it out eventually and just copy the file as well.


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