How to prevent installation of removable devices

In this article, we shall discuss how to prevent installation of removable devices. Please see How to restrict access to removable Storage Drives, how to Deny execute access: Restrict Access to USB Drives on Windows, and how to Disable and Enable USB Usage for Certain Users in Windows. Most at times (by default). When a USB device is connected to the computer, Windows automatically detects the device. It installs all needed driver automatically.

Note: With the above statement, this implies a USB can be readily used thereby leading to a security breach.

Because of this, I will be blocking access to USB, thereby preventing security leakage of confidential data and also the possible attacks of viruses into the network. Below are the steps to disable the installation of removable devices.

Please see how to Enable or disable BitLocker Drive Encryption on Windows, and “How to link a removable media to a Deployment Share: Replicate Deployment share to a removable device“.

Disable Installation of Removable Devices in Local Group Policy Editor

Type run in the Windows Search box as shown below. Click on the Run App. In the Run dialog window, type in “gpedit.msc” as shown below and click on ok

This will launch the group policy editor. The next step will be to configure the the policy to prevent the installation of removable media.

Click on the User Configuration, click Administrative Template to expand the menu. Click on System, and expand on Device Installation.

Double click on Prevent Installation of removable devices and Enable it.

I hope you fund this article on how to prevent installation of removable devices. Please feel free to leave a comment below.