# Temporary Deletion Protection

**URL:** <https://community.mp3tag.de/t/temporary-deletion-protection/56309>\
**Category:** Support\
**Created:** [February 14, 2022, 1:21am UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/temporary-deletion-protection/56309 "2022-02-14T01:21:05Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![rko31415](https://community.mp3tag.de/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/r/f19dbf/32.png) [@rko31415](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/rko31415)\
**Post date:** [February 14, 2022, 1:21am UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/temporary-deletion-protection/56309/1 "2022-02-14T01:21:05Z")

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I have gone through my music library and tagged each mp3 using Discogs. As a doublecheck, I made copies of the Mp3's in a separate folder and tagged them through MusicBrainz. I want to (manually) compare the two sets of data, and I find I'm accidentally deleting the originals too often. Is there a way to temporarily protect the original mp3's from deletion within Mp3tag? I can't do this using Windows Explorer since the original mp3's loaded come from a playlist generated from MusicBrainz results on the copies (a substantial subset of an even larger universe of mp3's).

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**Author:** ![LyricsLover](https://community.mp3tag.de/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/l/c6cbf5/32.png) [@LyricsLover](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/LyricsLover)\
**Post date:** [February 14, 2022, 7:47am UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/temporary-deletion-protection/56309/2 "2022-02-14T07:47:56Z")

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You could change the file permission and disable/deny the "Delete" right for the user(s) working with this original files:

> **[Prevent Files From Being Deleted Or Renamed In Windows](https://helpdeskgeek.com/how-to/prevent-file-deletion-and-file-renaming-in-windows/)**
>
> No matter what purpose you use your computer for, there are likely some files on your machine that you don’t want anyone to rename or delete. But unfortunately the way \[...\]

You have to do this twice: Once BEFORE you load the files into Mp3tag to prevent accidentally deleting your originals and once AFTER you have finished your comparison.

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**Author:** ![rko31415](https://community.mp3tag.de/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/r/f19dbf/32.png) [@rko31415](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/rko31415)\
**Post date:** [February 14, 2022, 8:31pm UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/temporary-deletion-protection/56309/3 "2022-02-14T20:31:12Z")

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Thanks LyricsLover but your solution is impractical in my case.  
I need to selectively (file by file) protect from deletion (and unprotect). I didn't mention when doing the side-by-side comparison I sometimes take MusicBrainz suggestion for the title (e.g., if mine didn't have the special foreign characters such as ñ) and so I modify my original files.  
So the need is for a "temporary" way to protect (and unprotect) individual files, not folders.  
I thought using iCACLS as one of the Mp3Tag tools might do this, but it turns out even Windows 10 has conspired against me in that once you protect a file from deletion, you also seem to protect if from being read.  
So I may just be out of luck.

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**Author:** ![Zerow](https://community.mp3tag.de/user_avatar/community.mp3tag.de/zerow/32/11379_2.png) [@Zerow](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/Zerow)\
**Post date:** [February 22, 2022, 6:46pm UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/temporary-deletion-protection/56309/4 "2022-02-22T18:46:51Z")

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Please report back if you find a solution to his problem

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**Author:** ![system](https://community.mp3tag.de/uploads/default/original/2X/c/ce7035d426cb755a7916793326d23b465222a407.png) [@system](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/system)\
**Post date:** [February 9, 2026, 12:29pm UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/temporary-deletion-protection/56309/5 "2026-02-09T12:29:40Z")

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