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Cannot delete files even though I am an administrator with "Full Control" access to the files.

Anonymous
2022-09-27T19:40:13+00:00

I am trying to delete some text files (.txt). I am using Windows 10, latest updates. No matter what I do, I get the message, I don't have the correct permission. I am an administrator on my computer (personal home computer). When I look at the security properties of the files, it says I am the owner of the file and have full control access to the file.

I did a search in this forum to get advice and all the advice mentions going into safe mode to delete the files. I did that and it doesn't work. It also suggests changing the security permissions. I don't know what I can change them to the give me anymore rights than "Full Control" as the owner of the file.

I went into CMD prompt as an administrator and used powershell to try to delete them, per advice I found through Google. Still didn't work.

How can some files prevent you from deleting them when you have ownership and full control. Is the file "hijacking" the Windows 10 security system to prevent deletion. They are just text files, not systems files or programs. They are not in any Windows directory and the attribute permissions are not set. Any advice would be appreciated.

Thank you

Windows for home | Windows 10 | Files, folders, and storage

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  1. Anonymous
    2022-09-29T03:08:24+00:00

    Hi, my name is Jose, I'm a Windows user like you and I'm glad to help you today. I'm sorry to hear this.

    Please run the following tool to repair Windows file system. Run CMD as administrator then type:

    Chkdsk c: /F

    Press enter. Confirm that the command will run in the next restart then reboot the computer to complete the procedure. Finally try again to delete the file.

    If you need anything else please let me know.

    10 people found this answer helpful.
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  2. Anonymous
    2022-09-28T02:27:43+00:00

    Anderson,

    Thank you for the advice, but your two links do not have anything to do with my issue. Link one has to do with taking ownership of the file. Per the security tab, I already have ownership of these text files. Link two applies to Microsoft Server 2012, I am not running on MS Server. I am running Windows 10. Also the second link has advice, but no steps on how to do that advice.

    3 people found this answer helpful.
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  3. Anonymous
    2022-09-27T20:19:51+00:00

    Hi, my name is Anderson Souza, I hope I can help you with your issue.

    On the page below the Microsoft support website you will see some procedures that can help you manipulate your files and folders with access problems, in addition to handling the file permissions, replacing the owner can also help in these cases:

    https://support.microsoft.com/topic/219af563-19...

    If after trying the above procedures the problem persists, you can try the documentation below with slightly more advanced procedures related to manipulating files and folders on the NTFS file system:

    https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/troubleshoot/w...

    I hope it helps you.

    1 person found this answer helpful.
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  4. Anonymous
    2022-09-27T20:00:11+00:00

    You can always boot into something non-Windows and easily and simply delete them at will (sometimes NTFS or fast startup may get in the way but that's easily dealt with).

    I'm not sure why you haven't been able to in Windows. Command line can normally do enough to do it but even that failed for you. I'll leave that for someone else to poke at.

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