Help, Windows Defender is holding my photos hostage.

[Lee Schierer]

We have one of those digital picture frames that we can load photos of our trips into for viewing. I normally resize the files so I can fit more on the SD card, leaving the original photo file intact. Last night I went to add some recent and not so recent photos to the SD card for the picture frame and found all my photo files and file folders on both my computers were read only. Apparently a recent windows update has done that to protect them from ransomware attacks. I know that my computer is not infected with anything and this is purely a Windows Defender problem. I've tried changing the read only status and it immediate changes back to read only. I've tried turning off the protected folder option in windows defender and they stay as read only.

The only way I can make any changes to a photo is to move the photo file to a desktop folder. Do what I want and then move the file back to the directory where it was.

I appreciate the protection, but it really makes it a pain to do anything with my photos. I have far too many photos to put them on Onedrive or other cloud service where I would have to pay for storage. I periodically back them up to a portable hard drive and the more recent ones reside on two computers.

I would like to be able to turn off the protection temporarily when I want to work on photos, but protect them the rest of the time. I also don't want them stored on the portable drive as read only.Any ideas?

[Rich Engelhardt]

Use Explorer to find your pictures folder.<br>
Right click on it - select properties - uncheck "Read Only" - select apply.<br>
<br>
When done doing what you want to do, go back and check "Read Only"-select apply

[Lee Schierer]

Use Explorer to find your pictures folder.<br>
Right click on it - select properties - uncheck "Read Only" - select apply.<br>
<br>
When done doing what you want to do, go back and check "Read Only"-select apply

Tried that, it worked today, but sure wasn't working last night. Last night I was about ready to toss the computer off the back deck. I hope it keeps on working.

Thank you.

[Kev Williams]

You could try sharing, and giving full access to folder with "everyone"--

right-click on the folder // properties // sharing // advanced sharing // checkmark the 'share this folder' box // permissions // -

if 'everyone' is already listed, then checkmark the 'full control' box... if not listed, click 'add', type 'everyone', then click 'ok'...

THEN, you should be back in the 'properties' window; click the SECURITY tab // Advanced ... There you should see all the permissions for this folder. As long as 'everyone' has full control you should be good...

[Lee Schierer]

You could try sharing, and giving full access to folder with "everyone"--

right-click on the folder // properties // sharing // advanced sharing // checkmark the 'share this folder' box // permissions // -

if 'everyone' is already listed, then checkmark the 'full control' box... if not listed, click 'add', type 'everyone', then click 'ok'...

THEN, you should be back in the 'properties' window; click the SECURITY tab // Advanced ... There you should see all the permissions for this folder. As long as 'everyone' has full control you should be good...

Folders were already shared. But Apps that previously could make changes were locked out.

I found a work around by adding those two apps to the list of programs that are allowed to make changes in the security settings for Windows Defender. Adding those two apps as exceptions seems to work much better than unlocking and locking the folders and files.

[Kev Williams]

I love computers.
I hate computers...

right now I'm trying to figure out which of the 8 mini-disks in front of me has the right driver for the parallel/serial card in this computer. My new antivirus has flagged 8 files on these disks, everything else that I CAN install HAS been installed-- device manager says the ports still no worky...
473788473789473790

[Luke Dupont]

Step 1: Install Linux
Step 2: Retrieve Photos from your Windows Partition from your Linux environment
Step 3: Uninstall Windows with its spyware and control freak software and use an OS that respects your autonomy and privacy.
Okay, I'm just giving Windows a hard time -- I know not everyone can install an OS or make the switch to Linux, but it is a solution seriously worth considering if you ever become inclined to venture down that rabbit hole.

In any case, this is a good lesson to back up your photos in a second location that you can access either physically or through the internet.