How To Create Undeletable Unrenamable Folders in Windows

For Windows operating system, we have a lots of security tools available to protect our files and folders from unauthorized access. We can lock them in a hidden vault using software like Folder Lock, put password on folders/files using Password Folder and many powerful locker software.

These tools either hide your confidential material or lock other users’ access so that no one can even view the content but that’s not the case always! Sometimes, we want to allow them view our material but limit only their suspicious actions(such as Deleting, Renaming) that can harm the content. Available locker software don’t provide such view-only rights to your folders.

So, if you have such kind of requirement then don’t go for such folder/file locker software. There is a very simple Windows trick which will help you achieve your aim i.e., “provide only viewing rights to your content and block delete and rename actions from those folders” without using software or script at all.

I am covering the trick below. So, scroll down the image to know how to create undeletable-unrenamable folders in Windows.

Understanding the basics

Windows have some reserved words for folder names: con,aux, lpt1, lpt2, lpt3 up to lpt9. It will not allow you to create folders using any of these names. Try creating or renaming any folders with these names and Windows will throw out an error message that The specified device name is invalid (see below).

These keywords are used by Windows itself for some of its important Windows files and folders. If you find any file/folder with the above names in Windows directory, you can’t delete or rename them (try it!).

So, your folder name should be one of these windows reserved names to make it undeletable and unrenamable. As you can’t create it directly on Windows, a way to get such kind of folder is to search out your computer’s Windows directory, copy it somewhere and delete available content to insert your own material but this would be a tedious task. So I have covered an easy trick below to get such kind of folders.

How to create Undeletable and Unrenemable folder?

1. Go to Start Menu and then click Run (or press Win+R) to get Run dialogue box.
2. Type cmd and hit enter to open Command Prompt.
3. You can’t create such folders in root drive i.e., where Windows is installed. So, if your Windows is installed in C: drive, type D: or E: in command prompt.
4. Now, your command prompt is in D: (or E:) drive. Type md con\ command to create folder with name “con” (md=make directory).
5. Now browse to the location (D: drive) and you’ll see a folder just created there with name con. You can use any of the windows reserved keywords  such aux, lpt1, lpt2, lpt3 up to lpt9 to create folders with these name through command prompt.
6. Add your material to the folder.

Try deleting or renaming it, Windows will not let you perform these actions.

How to delete Undeletable/Unrenamable folder?

So, if you have done with the required task with these undeletable-unrenamable folders and want to delete them, you can’t delete them manually as Windows will not allow. So, deleting undeletable-unrenamable folders will also be done from Command prompt. Follow these steps to delete undeletable/unrenamable folders in Windows:

1. Open command prompt
2. Type D: or E:, the drive letter where you have created the folder.
3. Type rd con\ command to remove the folder named con (rd=remove directory).
4. Now, open the drive, you’ll not find the folder here as it has been deleted.