MS Dos Command to password protect a file

There no built in DOS command for file encryption.

You can password protect entire folders...

attrib local +h +s

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Or use zip to encrypt a file...

zip -p pass123 file.zip your-file-path

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Or openssl to encrypt a file...

openssl aes-256-cbc -d -in file -out file.encrypted

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The first line is nonsense, that just hides the folder (making it a "system" hidden folder). No password involved.
But yes, there is nothing built-in you can use to password protect files or folders, you'll always need to use external tools - if you need a solution not bound to exactly one machine and user (NTFS encryption).

What's the primary purpose for protection?

Correct, to me the first approach is nonsense.

Only mentioned for completeness.

The best options will be zip for files which can actually be compressed for space savings + openssl for audio/video files which gain little or nothing by compression.

Hi,

What I need is a Dos command which can make an excel workbook read only mode. If I copy this file and paste it in other folder, this file should exist in read only mode.
Also, I want a dos command to make the above excel workbook into Normal mode.
Thanks
A

Likely best if you explain what you're trying to accomplish, as the more I read over your comments... some detail seems missing to understand what you're trying to accomplish.

Thank you for your code below to set a file read only. your code work for me because when I try to copy paste the file, still retains the read only mode. thats exactly I am looking for.

attrib +R filename

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May I know the similar code to make the file back to normal mode please?

attrib -r filename

Given that this an Excel file you want to write protect, you'd be much better off using the built in capability of Excel for that.  You can also assign a password as well if you wanted.  Details below:

• Read-only Workbook in Excel - Easy Excel Tutorial

---

»bp

Hi,
When i apply

attrib +R filename

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on an excel file it converts it to read only mode. then I copy the file and paste manually, it retains the read only mode. But when I apply below code to migrate the excel file to another location, below code coverts the excel file into normal mode.ie the read only mode does not available. Please have a look. I like to see the read only mode on the file I exported using the code below.

@echo off
setlocal
echo Start Copy

set SOURCE_DIR=C:\Reports\MonthlyReports
set DEST_DIRS="Y:\","S:\ Reports\"
set FILENAMES_TO_COPY="Report_New.xlsx"

pushd "%SOURCE_DIR%"

for %%F in (%FILENAMES_TO_COPY%) do (

    for %%D in (%DEST_DIRS%) do (
        echo file "%%~F" to "%%~D"
        xcopy /Y "%%~F" "%%~D"
    )
)
popd
echo. Done.
exit /b

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Thank you

If you use ROBOCOPY instead of XCOPY it will copy the attributes.

robocopy | Microsoft Docs

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»bp

No version of DOS that I am aware of ships with any type of file encryption capability. Hence, there will be no "DOS" command line to do that.  You require a third party application.

Hi Bill, I have changed Xcopy to Robocopy on the above code. Nothing has happened.

Error: Invalid parameter after robocopy "/Y"

Thank you
A

You need to change the syntax to

robocopy .  "%%~D" "%%~F"

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In fact, this should be sufficient

@echo off
setlocal
echo Start Copy

set SOURCE_DIR=C:\Reports\MonthlyReports
set DEST_DIRS="Y:\","S:\ Reports\"
set FILENAMES_TO_COPY="Report_New.xlsx"

for %%D in (%DEST_DIRS%) do robocopy %SOURCE_DIR%  "%%~D" %FILENAMES_TO_COPY /njs /njh

echo. Done.
exit /b

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@Asatoma, likely best to close out this question, as there are several answers to your original question.

Then open another question about how to do file copy operations + preserve file attributes.

Thanks