A handy and Secured Way to Hide Files and Folders in Windows XP

As we wrote earlier the article Hide Files or Folders in the Command Prompt in Windows XP, we decided to write another article about that issue. You should be very much familiar with the situation when you need to hide a data or secure a file/folder from a person who uses your computer. If you are in a situation like that, then we think we can provide you a better technique.

Usually people hide a file or folder by making it hidden from the properties or changing the  file attributes in command prompt or using some software. But hiding the files or folders by changing in the properties and the Windows explorer settings is not a secured way any more.If your friend is a computer savvy then he will easily unhide the file or folders. It is better process to hide them using some software. But when you are computer geek then why not try to do it without using any software?

Tip: Send Your Secret Emails With Lockbin.

All we need in this process is just notepad in which we shall create a batch program for both to hide a file and folder also. When you’ll double click the batch program for hiding, the file or folder will just look like a control panel item. So if someone sees that file or folder, he’ll think that it is some kind of system files and he will not go further for finding the content behind this. Even if he double clicks on that file or folder to open, then it will redirect him in the control panel menu. Thus it is a very simple and effective way. Here I  have described the whole process  in step by step:

Step 1: Suppose you have a folder named ‘softslas’ in your ‘d’ drive(d:) and you want to keep it’s contents secret.For this create a text document and copy the following command  into it

ren softslas softslas.{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D}

Step 2: Just save it as “hide.bat”(including the quotes) in the same location you have kept your file or folder.You have to just change ‘softslas’ as per your file or folder’s name.

Your batch file for hiding your content is now created. By double clicking on hide.bat, the desired file or folder’s icon will change to control panel’s icon.on double click the control panel window will open.

Now that was how to hide.Now to get back in your content you have to unhide it or return in it’s original state follow this

Step 1:To unhide the file or folder just create another text document and copy the following into it-

ren softslas.{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D} softslas

Step 2: Save it as “unhide.bat” in the same location as before.Change ‘softslas’ as per your file or folder’s name.You have to just double click on unhide.bat to get your hidden folder or file  back.

But if you keep the bat files in the same location where the files or folder(you want to hide) reside then the planning may be go in vein.

To keep hide.bat and unhide.bat somewhere else just mention the path of the file or folder location in the command. As in our example

ren d:\softslas softslas.{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D}

And

ren d:\softslas.{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D} softslas

Isn’t was a very handy and simple way? Leave your comment. If you know any other technique then please share with us.