Registry Tweak to Disable Access to USB Ports in Windows XP

This simple registry tweak that can disable USB storage access can be particularly helpful in client/server environment to disable access to the USB Ports for a certain group of users.

  1. Goto Start–>Run… and type regedit and click OK.
    regedit command
  2. From the Registry Editor window that pops-up navigate and click on the following subkey:
    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESYSTEMCurrentControlSetServicesUsbStor
  3. From the right pane, right-click on Start and select modify. Then change the value data from 3(default) to 4 in hexadecimal mode.
    windows registry
  4. Close the Registry editor and restart.

That’s it!! USB port access is disabled.
To enable again just change the value data to the default value 3.

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