How do I lock a shared folder in Google Drive?

If you share a lot of files over your Google Drive then you might have considered password protecting the folders on your drive.

Well, there is no stock way to password protect a Google Drive folder. However, there are a few workarounds that can help you in achieving that.

In this article, I am going to show you how to password protect a Google Drive folder. Using these methods, you can add an extra layer of security to the folders on your drive.

Upload an Encrypted Folder to the Google Drive

As mentioned earlier, you cant password protect a Google Drive folder by a built-in method. It has to be the other way. Now one good idea to do that is to password protect a folder on your computer and then upload it to the drive.

Here is what you have to do:

• First of all, password protect your folder on your computer(Windows or Mac). You can use any third-party applications like 7-Zip, etc for this purpose.
• Then upload this encrypted folder to your GDrive like you would upload any other folder.
• Now if someone wants to download this ZIP folder, they will have to enter the password to open it.

Thats it! This is one of the most straightforward ways of doing the job.

There are some third-party tools that can help you password protect a Google Drive folder. These tools create passwords for the Drive links which is really efficient if you want to save your confidential data on the drive.

One such tool is Link Lock by Jacob Strieb. This tool takes your GDrive links and encrypts them with a password. The tool is very secure and safe to use.

• First of all, copy the link of the folder on GDrive you want to encrypt.
• Paste this link on this site.
• Create a password and confirm it.
• Click on Encrypt

Once the tool finishes the encryption, you will get a new link at the bottom which will be a password-protected link to the folder.

Using Google Forms

If you do not want to create a password-protected folder on GDrive using other apps, you can do it by using Google Forms. The method is simple but involves some steps so follow carefully.

Step 1: Go to your GDrive and click on New on the top-left side. Here, select Google Forms from the list.

Step 2: Now you can add the title name of your form.

Step 3: In the Untitled Question, add the Password details just like I did. Change the Multiple Choice option to Short Answer using the drop-down menu.

Step 4: Turn on the Required toggle.

Step 5: Click on the three-dots icon next to the Required toggle and then click on Response validation.

Step 6: You will see more options here, select Regular Expansion and Contains from the drop-down menu.

Step 7: In the Pattern area, you can enter your password(alphanumeric) and type an error message in the Custom error text. This message will be displayed if someone enters the wrong password.

Step 8: Go to the Settings tab and expand Presentation.

Step 9: Under the Confirmation message, enter the drive link for the folder you want to password-protect.

Step 10: Now you can hit the blue Send button and share the link to the form.

Thats it! Now if someone clicks on the link, he/she will have to enter the password first to get entry into the folder.

Closing Phrase

So that was all about how to password protect a Google Drive folder. There is no stock way of doing it so you have to manage with these workarounds which work just fine. I hope this article helps you in protecting files and folders on your Google Drive.

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