Encrypt or Decrypt Files and Folders through the Right Click Context Menu in Vista


Windows Vista has a built in file encryption utility. If you use this utility quite frequently, you may want to add this option to the contextual menu (the menu that opens on right-clicking a file). This would make it quite easy to encrypt or decrypt your files rather than using the file properties dialog box. To add the encrypt option to your context menu,

  • Click ‘Start’ and type ‘regedit’.
  • Navigate to ‘HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced’.
  • Right-click on the right pane and select ‘New > DWORD 32 bit Value’.
  • Name the new key as ‘EncryptionContextMenu’.
  • Once the key is created, double-click it and enter the integer ‘1’ in the ‘Value data’ field.
  • Close the registry editor.

Now whenever you right click a file, you’ll find the ‘Encrypt’ option in the contextual menu. You can easily encrypt and decrypt files using this feature.

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