Screensavers are programmes that play moving pictures or patterns on your monitor display when you’re not active on your PC for a specific amount of time. The older monitors were protected by this. Today we are going to share “How to Password Protect the Screensaver in Windows 10.”
There is also an option to restart the screensaver and display the login screen. When some users are away for a specific period, they may want to lock their system. It will display the screensaver and lock the computer shortly thereafter.
Password: Protect the Screensaver in Windows 10
There are three methods to password-protect the screensaver in Windows 10.
- Using the Screensaver Settings
- Using the Local Group Policy Editor
- By using the Registry Editor
Method 1: Using the screensaver setting.
The usual and most used method of enabling screensaver protection is the screensaver settings in Windows. This works for screensavers set by the user. The screen does not lock as soon as it starts. It takes a few seconds for the screen to be locked on your system.
- First, open the settings in your window.
- To open the Windows Settings app, hold the Windows key and press I.
- Then select personalisation settings.
- Now, scroll down to the bottom of the left pane and click on Lock Screen.
- Then click on the Screen Saver Settings option.
- The next step is to set the Screensaver and check the “On resume, display logon screen” option.
- Screensaver protection can be enabled and disabled from here.
- That’s it…..
Method 2: Using the Group Policy Editor
Windows Group Policy is a tool that allows access to the operating system’s settings. It allows you to enable and disable screensaver password protection. The check box also greys out the standard users’ right to make changes without administrator rights.
For Windows Home users, this method isn’t necessary. You can try other ways. However, if you already have Group Policy Editor on your computer, then follow the below steps:
- Use the Windows + R keyboard shortcuts to open the Run dialogue box. Type “gpedit.msc” in the box and hit Enter. The Local Group Policy Editor window will open on your system.
- Then, navigate to:
- User Configuration\ Administrative Templates\ Control Panel\ Personalization\
- Then double-click the policy named “Password Protect the Screen Saver,” and you’ll see a new window open. Scroll down on the page, and you’ll see the toggle option enabled.
- Note: You can disable or remove password protection by selecting the Disabled option.
- Then, click the Apply and OK buttons to save the changes.
- The group policy has been updated most of the time automatically. Otherwise, the group policy must be updated manually.
- Run Command Prompt via the search feature on Windows and type in the following command as an administrator. Now hit the Enter key to run it. It can also be done by restarting the computer.
- gpupdate /force
- In step 3, you can revert back to the default settings by setting the toggle option to Not Configured.
- That’s it…
Method 3: Use the Registry Editor
The Registry Editor is a database that stores all information about the operating system and applications. If you already configured the screensaver password protection setting with Group Policy Editor, then the registry will be configured for the same setting.
If you use this method directly, you will need to set it up by hand because some keys and values aren’t present to configure the settings. The steps provided below also include a step for creating a registry backup. You can choose to create a backup or skip making a backup; it’s up to you.
- First, clicking the Windows and R keys together on your keyboard opens the Run box. Then you must enter “Regedit” in the box and click the Enter key or click on the Okay button to open the Registry Editor. If prompted by the UAC prompt, just click on the Yes button.
- The registry backup is created by clicking on the File menu, choosing the Export option that appears as a context menu, then naming the file and setting a path. Then click on the Save button to conclude the registry backup process.
- Note: To restore a registry backup, you can click the Import option on the File menu. Now you just need to select the backup file you made recently.
- The Registry Editor window will have the following location:
- HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Control Panel\Desktop
- Note: If the Desktop key does not appear, just right-click or right-tap on the Control Panel key and choose the New > Key option. Then you can rename the newly created key to “Desktop.”
- Right-click on the Desktop key’s right panel, then choose the New > String Value option. Then rename the value to “ScreenSaverIsSecure” and save it.
- To activate Screensaver Protection, double-click the ScreenSaverIsSecure value, and it will open a small dialog. Change the value of data to 1 to activate Screensaver Protection.
- Note: If you want to disable the protection and grayout options, set the value of data to 0.
- In the end, close the Registry Editor window, reboot your computer, and you’re done.
- The Registry Editor allows you to revert to the default setting by removing the value.
- That’s it…
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