If you need stronger protections, you might want to consider investing in third-party software that’s specially designed for this purpose. Just remember to lock your account (Win+L) whenever you walk away from the screen – your files will be unencrypted as soon as you log in! However, it’s ideal if you’re using a shared PC and just want to keep some files inaccessible to other user accounts on the device. Once again, we’ll remind you this method isn’t intended for high-security purposes. After encryption, you can also press the “Details” button next to the checkbox to see information about the encryption certificate and available recovery procedures. Just untick the “Encrypt contents to secure data” checkbox and click OK to close the windows. You can reverse the encryption at any time by heading back to the Properties window and opening the Advanced Attributes pane again. If anyone else tries to access the file – whether from another user account or by physically removing your hard drive – the contents will appear to be meaningless garbled text. They’re encrypted with a key that’s tied down to your Windows user account. With the backup done, your files are now secured.
