BleepingComputer.com: Unencrypting Files

Alright, so... I have a good 500 pictures that all worked fine. I moved them to my portable hard drive, and now some of them seem to be encrypted, when before they were merely compressed. About 50 of them are now encrypted, and are unusable. I try to open them in Windows picture viewer, and it just shows an x.

They are all .jpg files, but I have plenty of .jpg files that work. There doesn't seem to be a certain name that affected them this way, and they are spread out between two folders, both with pictures that work inside their respective folders. They do not appear to be encrypted with any particular program, just with Windows XP. But when I right click properties to unselect Encrypt, it is grayed out. It also won't let me compress those files. It won't even let me move them off of the hard drive, it just says access is denied.

What can I do to fix it? (Unencrypt them so they will become usable)

Thanks!

Are you the only user on your computer? Are you an admin on your PC? It is a possibility that someone else encrypted them.

Right-click on an encrypted file select Properties, click on Advanced button, then click on Details. You would see user(s) listed who can see the file transparently. Politely ask one of them to decrypt the files.

I am an admin, but I am not the only user. Also, the other use doesn't have access to my hard drive.

The details button is grayed out and unclickable.

This post has been edited by GalinKinlin: 23 September 2009 - 04:59 PM

If the Details is grayed out, then you are not the original user who encrypted that file. Moreover, the user permissions on that files have been removed or altered. This can happen if you copy an encrypted file from one network/computer to entirely different computer/network.

If the original user who encrypted does not give you permission you cannot decrypt the file.

Read this article : http://support.microsoft.com/kb/308993