Last Updated on June 23, 2020 by Larious
Well, if your family members or friends use your personal computer, or if you have a public computer that several people use, then its always the best to restrict access to specific drives in My Computer. On Windows, you can easily limit access to specific drives to prevent others from accessing important data, or deleting system files.
In this article, we are not going to share methods to password-protect the drives to prevent unauthorized access to the drives, but we are going to temporarily block the unauthorized access to the hard drives. So, without wasting any further time, let’s know how to restrict access to drives from My Computer in Windows 10.
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How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows
Well, to prevent access to the drives in My Computer in Windows 10, users need to make a few changes in the Local Group Policy Editor. Below, we have shared a step-by-step tutorial on how to restrict access to drives in My Computer in Windows 10.
Step 1. First of all press Windows Key + R to open the Run Dialog box.
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 47 Open RUN Dialog Box](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
Step 2. On the RUN Dialog box, enter ‘gpedit.msc’ and hit enter.
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 48 Enter 'gpedit.msc'](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924349_844_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 49 Enter 'gpedit.msc'](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924349_844_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
Step 3. This Run command will take you to the Local Group Policy Editor.
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 50 Local Group Policy Editor](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924350_573_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 51 Local Group Policy Editor](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924350_573_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
Step 4. There you need to navigate to the – User Configuration/Administrative Templates/Windows Components/File Explorer
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 52 Navigate to the given path](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924351_571_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 53 Navigate to the given path](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924351_571_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
Step 5. From the right-hand side panel, double click on the ‘Prevent Access to drives from My Computer’
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 54 Double click on the 'Prevent Access to drives from My Computer'](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924351_312_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 55 Double click on the 'Prevent Access to drives from My Computer'](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924351_312_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
Step 6. You need to enable the option and then from the ‘Options’ select which drive you to want to restrict and click on ‘Ok’.
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 56 Select 'Enabled' and choose the drive](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924352_746_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 57 Select 'Enabled' and choose the drive](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924352_746_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
That’s it, you are done! Now if anyone tries to access the restricted drive, they will get an error message like this.
How To Allow Access To The Drives?
Well, if you have restricted access to certain drives and want to revert the changes, then you need to follow the steps given below.
Step 1. First of all press Windows Key + R to open the Run Dialog box.
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 58 Open RUN Dialog Box](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924354_525_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 59 Open RUN Dialog Box](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924354_525_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
Step 2. On the RUN Dialog box, enter ‘gpedit.msc’ and hit enter.
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 60 Enter gpedit.msc and hit Enter](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924355_391_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 61 Enter gpedit.msc and hit Enter](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924355_391_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
Step 3. This Run command will take you to the Local Group Policy Editor.
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 62 Local Group Policy Editor](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924357_89_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 63 Local Group Policy Editor](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924357_89_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
Step 4. There you need to navigate to the – User Configuration/Administrative Templates/Windows Components/File Explorer
.
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 64 Navigate to the Given Path](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924357_800_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 65 Navigate to the Given Path](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924357_800_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
Step 5. From the right-hand side panel, double click on the ‘Prevent Access to drives from My Computer’
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 66 Double click on 'Prevent access to drives from My Computer'](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924358_547_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 67 Double click on 'Prevent access to drives from My Computer'](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924358_547_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
Step 6. Now from the ‘Options’ you need to select the option ‘Do not restrict drives’ and then click on ‘Ok’
Step 7. Now from the same window, you need to select ‘Disabled’ under the ‘Prevent access to drives from My computer’
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 68 Select 'Disabled' and click on 'Ok' button](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924359_997_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
![How To Prevent Access To Drives In My Computer In Windows 69 Select 'Disabled' and click on 'Ok' button](https://lowkeytech.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/1592924359_997_How-To-Prevent-Access-To-Drives-In-My-Computer-In.jpg)
That’s it; you are done! This is how you can allow access to drives on Windows 10.
So, this is all about how to restrict access to drives in My Computer in Windows 10. I hope this article helped you share it with others as well.