How to Disable Access to Windows Registry Windows 10 – 2 Ways

• Should I disable network access to Windows Registry?
• How do I turn off registry editor?
• How do I disable Regedit in Windows 10?

Should I disable network access to Window Registry? Improper changes to Registry may make your computer run abnormally or unbootable. If you share your computer with others, you may want to prevent or block others from accessing and editing the registry. Here comes to the issue, how to disable access to Windows Registry Editor in Windows 10? Below we introduce 3 ways.

How to Disable Network Access to Windows Registry Windows 10 – 2 Methods

Method 1. Disable Access to Windows Registry by Editing Registry

You can restrict access to Registry Editor in Windows 10 by editing registry in Windows 10/8/7. Check the detailed guide below.

• You can press Windows + R to open Run, type regedit in Run, and hit Enter to open Registry Editor in Windows 10.
• Next you can navigate to the following key in Registry Editor window: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System.
• Click System key, and right-click the blank space in the right window to select New -> DWORD (32-BIT) Value to create a new registry key. Input the name for the key DisableRegistryTools.
• Then you can double-click DisableRegistryTools to open its properties dialog, and set it value to 1. Click OK and exit Windows Registry Editor.

This will disable access to Registry Editor for the current user. It will pop up an error message “Registry editing has been disabled by your administrator” when you try to open Registry Editor.

Since you don’t have access to Regedit, if you want to regain access to Registry, you can open elevated Command Prompt in Windows 10, type the following command line in Command Prompt and hit Enter to change the DisableRegistryTools value from 1 to 0.

reg add “HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System” /t Reg_dword /v DisableRegistryTools /f /d 0

Alternatively, you can also log on with another administrator account, and open Registry Editor to delete the registry key DisableRegistryTools.

Method 2. Disable Access to Registry Editor with Group Policy

• You can press Windows + R, type msc in Run, and hit Enter to open Local Group Policy Editor.
• In Local Group Policy Editor window, you can click User Configuration -> Administrative Templates -> System in the left panel.
• In the right window, scroll down to find Prevent access to registry editing tools, double-click it to open this option.
• In Prevent access to registry editing tools window, you can tick Enabled option in the upper left corner. Click OK to save the changes and restart your computer.

This method will restrict all users from accessing Windows Registry Editor including yourself. If you want to access Registry Editor again, you can follow the same instructions above to open Prevent access to registry editing tools in Local Group Policy Editor, and change the configuration to Not Configured.

Bottom Line

As for how to disable network access to Windows Registry in Windows 10, you can try one of the 2 ways above.

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