File Access Denied on Windows XP and how to take ownership

Problem with file ownership in Windows! Here is how to take ownership of a file or folder in Windows XP.

In the recent hard disc crash, I had a back-up for most of my files. Some of the files on a back-up drive was somehow avoiding me with an “Access Denied” even though I was logged in as the Administrator (or Administrative Rights). While asking around for help, a member from the Team Macromedia suggested me to google for the same. I finally got the solution on How to take ownership of a file or folder in Windows XP.

Here are the steps in quickie mode

Log on to the computer with an account that has administrative credentials. If you are running Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition, you must start the computer in safe mode, and then log on with an account that has Administrative rights to have access to the Security tab.
If you are using Windows XP Professional, you must disable Simple File Sharing.
Right-click the folder/file that you want to take ownership of, and then click Properties.
Click the Security tab, and then click OK on the Security message (if one appears).
Click Advanced, and then click the Owner tab.
In the Name list, click your user name, or click Administrator if you are logged in as Administrator, or click the Administrators group. If you want to take ownership of the contents of that folder, select the Replace owner on subcontainers and objects check box.
Click OK, and then click Yes when you receive the following message:
You do not have permission to read the contents of directory folderName. Do you want to replace the directory permissions with permissions granting you Full Control?
All permissions will be replaced if you press Yes.
Click OK, and then reapply the permissions and security settings that you want for the folder and its contents.

Brajeshwar posted this article on Sat, Sep 24th, 2005 at 5:34 am
Categorized under Technology and has the following tags

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Anonymous January 11th, 2006 at 1:58 pm 1

Thanks a lot for this info! Exactly what I was looking for…!
Fredrik April 29th, 2007 at 8:32 pm 2

Many thanks! This one certainly saved my day.
Arne May 24th, 2007 at 9:42 am 3

Bummer, that doesnt work. The files are from another computer I discarded and are encrypted. No way to get access even though I am the one that encrypted them in the first place.
Craig July 25th, 2007 at 5:44 pm 4

Perfect, this solved my problem, can’t thanks you enough!
Deon March 21st, 2008 at 11:38 pm 5

Thanks very much! It had been so long since I’d seen the Security tab in WinXP Home that I forgot how to get to it.
J. April 17th, 2008 at 10:35 am 6

Well and what to do if there is no Security tab in the preferences dialog of a particular folder? Logged in as Admin, all attempt to touch the folder results “Access denied”
sean April 19th, 2008 at 4:21 am 7

Wow this worked Great, i backed up a Computer and it told me that the files were private. well this did the trick
Jean-Pierre July 30th, 2008 at 1:00 pm 8

Man! Thanks SOOOO much for this! It helped to get back files from a directory I “shared” on the network that never shared properly. After disabling sharing, I had no access to the directory or any of the “non-existent files” inside. (Properties kept saying the directory was 0 bytes when there are many databases inside totalling 500MB+ each!

So thanks! This sorted out my problem!
Adrian September 5th, 2008 at 12:08 pm 9

Does this methord work if your recovering files from another machine that has died?
Arne September 10th, 2008 at 2:41 am 10

This method only works if the files were not encrypted. If they are encrypted you are out of luck.
Dario de Judicibus September 10th, 2008 at 11:37 pm 11

There is a simpler way that does not require in XP Home to go to Safe Mode. See my review about FaJo XP File Security Extension. I spent three hours to realize my problem was related to ownership and not to process lock. In 5 minutes I solved it by this German too.
dude November 7th, 2008 at 6:31 pm 12

This helped tremendously. My situation was this: my desktop’s motherboard failed, needed documents off the desktop’s hard drive. Bought a IDE SATA to USB cable, connected desktop hard drive to laptop’s USB port, tried accessing documents but ran into “access is denied” because desktop was password protected. Found this site, had to look up how to turn off simple file share (found solution here: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307874 ) and at this moment I am taking ownership of my desktop files! Thanks for the solution.
D-Man January 28th, 2009 at 5:23 am 13

Thank you so much!!!!! This was a quick solution to what I was trying to do… I thought I was going to have to deal with resetting permissions and crap for days or even weeks. Again, thank you, thank you, thank you!
ganesh narayan chitrekar March 12th, 2009 at 7:29 am 14

I Have changed the ownership of the files but still it is not accessible…

please tell me how can i get it done?????
Amazed March 20th, 2009 at 9:19 pm 15

YOU HAVE SAVED MY LIFE!!!! MY COMPUTER CRASHED AND CREATED A NEW PROFILE FOR ME. IT’S working beautifully except I lost all my old content. I was able to move my docs into the new profile and am now the owner of a working computer thank you thank you thank you.
CLOYD SHIFFER April 17th, 2009 at 11:49 pm 16

This information is great. I tried another article but they didn’t mention that in Windows XP home you had to start the computer in the safe mode to get to the security tab.
Thanks a million.
Cloyd Shiffer
Boyd July 2nd, 2009 at 6:13 pm 17

Got me back into a hijacked Hosts file. Like most everyone else above has said, great advice. Many thanks.

Boyd