Trusted Location
By Richard Rost
4 years ago
Set Up a Trusted Location (Folder) in Access
In this video, I will show you how to set up a Trusted Location (Folder) on your PC so that you can avoid seeing Microsoft's security warnings and have your VBA or macros disabled every time you open the database.
I will show you how to do this in Access itself for users who have the full version of Office installed. I will also show advanced users how to do this by editing the Windows Registry which will even work if you are running just the Access Runtime edition.
Gavin from Detroit, Michigan (a Gold Member) asks: I routinely get database file updates from my home office. Whenever I download a new file, I get yellow bar across the top of the screen that gives me a security warning and nothing in the database works. I can click to enable the content, but that's annoying to have to do it every time. Is there a way to disable that?
Connor from Galway, Ireland (a Platinum Member) asks: I've built my database following your videos, and everything works great. I've set up a bunch of users on my network with a split database using the Runtime edition of Access. They are getting the Microsoft Access Security Notice every time they open the database. How can I get rid of that on their PCs since they don't have the full version of Office?
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 Registry Key
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\16.0\
Access\Security\Trusted Locations\
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microsoft access, ms access, ms access tutorial, #msaccess, #microsoftaccess, #help, #howto, #tutorial, #learn, #lesson, #training, #database, trusted location, trusted folder, security warning, enable content, trust center, split database, encrypt, back-end, front-end, runtime, registry keys
Intro In this video, I will show you how to set up a trusted location in Microsoft Access to eliminate those recurring security warnings when opening databases, whether you're using the full version of Access or just the runtime edition. We'll talk about why these security prompts appear, how to create a dedicated trusted folder, and for advanced users, I'll walk you through adding a trusted location using the Windows registry for systems running only the runtime version of Access. This will help you simplify database access for yourself and users across your network.Transcript Welcome to another TechHelp video brought to you by AccessLearningZone.com. I am your instructor, Richard Rost. In today's video, I'm going to show you how to set up a trusted location for your databases so you don't see those annoying security warnings, whether or not you actually have the full version of Access installed.
Today we've got two questions. The first one is from Gavin in Detroit, Michigan, one of my platinum members. Later on, we'll be hearing from Connor in Galway, Ireland.
But first, Gavin says, I routinely get database file updates from my home office. Whenever I download a new file, I get a yellow bar across the top of the screen that gives me a security warning and nothing in the database works. I can click to enable the content, but that's annoying to have to do it every time. Is there a way to disable that?
So here's what's happening to Gavin. Gavin is downloading a new file from his home office's website. Let's assume it's in his downloads folder. If you open up this database file, you get the security warning up here. It says active content has been disabled. If you click on any of the buttons in here, nothing seems to work because all the VBA has been disabled.
This is something that Microsoft does to protect you in case you download a database file from a disreputable website or someone emails it to you. Unless you put it in a trusted folder, a trusted location, or you manually click to enable the content, then everything in this database will be disabled.
Now I just enabled it so, as you can see, it's now working. But that is annoying to do every time you download something.
What you can do is you can set up a trusted folder. Now, I don't recommend trusting your downloads folder just in case, but you can make a trusted folder pretty much anywhere you want, like right on your desktop. Let me close this.
Right over here on my desktop, I'll make a new folder. We'll call this Rix Trusted folder. How do we set this up so it is now trusted? Open up Access and go into Options, Trust Center, Trust Center Settings, Trusted Locations. Come down to Add New Location and browse to wherever it is. This one's on my desktop, so Rix Trusted folder. Click OK.
If you want to make subfolders of this location trusted also, that's fine. If you want to have different folders underneath this one, hit OK. Now you'll see it's in your trusted folder list. Hit OK again. OK, one more time. Now close Access.
Now I'm going to delete this one and go download a fresh copy off my website. So I downloaded a fresh copy and let me open this up just to make sure, yep, it's not trusted. So close that.
All we have to do is just take this guy and move it over here into Rix Trusted folder. Now if I open this up and run it from here, notice there's no warning message.
Set yourself a trusted folder. Only put things in your trusted folder that you absolutely trust. If it comes from my website, you know you can trust it. I check everything, and I'm the only one that can upload stuff.
If you want to learn more about trusted folders, I cover that in my Access Beginner Level 2 class. I show you almost right away how you can get in there and set up a trusted folder and talk about some other stuff too.
Now for part two. This is for more advanced users. This one's from Connor in Galway, Ireland. Connor is a Platinum member. He's also one of my developer students.
So as I built my database following your videos and everything works great. I set up a bunch of users on my network with a split database using the runtime edition of Access. They are getting the Microsoft Access Security Notice every time they open up the database. How can I get rid of that on their PC since they don't have the full version of Office?
A little background for everybody else. If you want to distribute your database onto multiple computers in your office and it's for people who don't necessarily need to design the database, they just want to be able to run it. You build it, they work with it. You don't have to purchase full copies of Microsoft Office for all of those users. You can use something called the runtime edition.
I have a whole video that explains how to download it, install it, and set it up on your systems. What you do in those cases is you split your database. You've got front end and back end files. The front end's got all the forms and reports and stuff like that. The back end has all the data and the tables.
Once you split it, you encrypt their front end copy so they can't mess with it. You point them to the back end and everything works just fine. They can use it for free and they can't mess with the database. I have all these videos here that explain how to set all that up.
The problem is they don't have the full version of Access on their machine, so they can't open up the Trust Center and set up a trusted location. Every time they run the database, they'll get this warning. It's the Microsoft Access Security Notice.
If you are okay with them being a little annoyed, just have them hit Open and they can continue working like nothing ever happened. If you want to get rid of that security notice and still use the runtime, I'll show you how to do it.
In order to do this, you have to edit the Windows registry. There's a key that you can put in the Windows registry in a specific spot that I'm going to tell you in just a minute where you can tell Access what your trusted folder is.
I'm going to warn you. Back up everything, back up your database, back up Windows to a full system backup of your computer. If you edit the registry and mess things up, you can make your computer not bootable. Be very careful with what you're doing. I don't want any emails from someone who said they messed up their computer with what I showed you.
I'm going to show you something that's very simple as long as you do it right. But please, before you do this, back up everything. You have been warned.
In case you don't know what the Windows registry is, it's basically a database that Windows uses for all of your settings for your system and all the different software applications that are installed in Windows will look to the registry for their settings information.
There's a specific registry key right here. It's HKey Current User (that's for the current user logged on), Microsoft Office 16.0 (that's Access 2019/365), Access, Security, Trusted Locations. In the Trusted Locations folder, there's a whole bunch of keys in here. Each one of these represents a different location. This one, for example, is my server database.
You have to add your own custom location using the registry in order to bypass that security warning when Access starts up. I'm going to show you how to do it.
Before we do this, what are we doing again? We're backing up everything to a full system backup before you start messing with the registry, especially if this is your first time using the registry editor.
Come down to your Start button. We're going to look for REGEDIT, the registry editor. Put that guy up. You will get the Windows permissions pop up that says, you have to have administrative rights to do this. Are you sure? Say yes, then this guy loads up. This is the registry editor.
I'm not going to do a full class on how to use the registry. This is just real quick to get Access working. We're going to open up HKey Current User, then Software, then Microsoft. Scroll down as a lot more. Office, there's Office.
Under Office, you're going to go to 16.0. That's the most recent version right now. This is Access 2019 or 365. Then Access, then Security, then Trusted Locations.
I have a bunch of them set up on this computer because I've got the full version of Access. So I have them set up in my Trusted Locations under there. Each one of these locations represents a different folder. You can see here, there's that one. There's my G drive. There's my C:\\Users\\Amocrine\\Desktop. That's my Desktop folder.
All you really have to do is create a new key under here. Give it any name you want and then create a string value under that called Path.
Go to Trusted Locations, right click, New Key. Call this whatever you want, Rix Database. Over here on the right, right click, New String Value, and call this Path (P-A-T-H). It's got to be exactly that: Path. Now open that up by double clicking on it and put in here the folder that you want to make your Trusted Location. I'll put in here C:\\Test Database\\ (always end it with a backslash). That doesn't exist, but I'll add it in a second. Hit OK.
There it is. I've got a Trusted Location. Now, the folder "Rix Database," that name is kind of meaningless, and the Path is Test Database. There are other things you can put in here too, like the AllowSubfolders value, the date, a description if you want, but you don't need all that stuff. All you need is just the Path.
These changes in the registry take place immediately. You don't have to reboot or close this or restart whatever. Let's go make this Test Database folder.
Here I am on my C drive, right click, New Folder, Test Database. This should be a trusted folder now.
Let me go download another copy of that database. Now when I open this up, it's in a trusted folder and notice I don't get any security warnings.
Here's another database that I have set up on my Access Database Cloud. I recently teamed up with Access Database Cloud to provide online access hosting for your databases. If you want to learn more, check out this web page. I'll put a link down below.
I've got a shared database set up here. Here's the front end and the back end is in a shared folder right there. There's the shared folder. We don't need to worry about this guy. What we need to know is the location of this file because this is what we have to put inside of our Trusted Locations.
This guy's sitting on the desktop. How do we find the desktop? Go to C, and it's going to be under Users, the user name, this is user 1, the account you're on, Desktop. There's the path right there. Click there. It's C:\\Users\\user.1\\Desktop. Copy that to your clipboard.
Wherever that database is running out of, that's where you've got to put that trusted location in. The back end, as long as you're just pulling data off the tables there, you don't have to put that in the Trusted Center.
Now let's go to the registry editor, Regedit. There it is. There's that warning message. I couldn't show it to you before because my local PC stops my video recorder, but I'll hit Yes.
Here we are. I was playing around with it earlier, so I'm right there. HKey Current User, Software, Microsoft, Office, etc., Trusted Locations. There's that location 2 as the default that's always set up.
We're going to click on Trusted Locations right here. Right click, New Key. We're going to call it whatever you want, RixDB, whatever you want to name it. Just make it a nice name.
In here, right click, New String Value. What do we have to call it? Path. It's got to be called Path. Double click, and then paste in that folder and put a backslash on the end of it. Then hit OK.
These changes take place immediately, so you do not have to worry about it. We can close that. We're done with it. We can close that too. Now when I run my database, voila, no security warning. One little registry edit, and you can do all that stuff. It works perfectly.
The downside is you do have to do this on every machine or every instance of your cloud server, depending on what you're doing. If you're in a LAN, you're on a local network, you have to go around to everyone's computers and set it up that way. Once you make that edit, you won't have to worry about it ever again in the future, unless you replace the machine.
But Rick, you say, there has to be an easier way than going around to every machine and going into the registry editor and typing in all this information. There's got to be an easier way to do it. Well, of course there is. We can use our good friend VBA to do this for us. With just a couple of lines of code, we can make a button so when the users themselves open up the database for the first time, they just click on the button and it adds that registry key. Then they don't have to worry about it anymore. You can even program it to be automatic if you want to. I prefer the button just to be safe.
I will show you how to do it in the extended cut for the members. Silver members and up get access to all of my extended cut videos. Silver members get access to download these videos, download the database, and the code vault where all the code is stored.
How do you become a member? Click on the Join button below the video. After you click the Join button, you'll see a list of all the different membership levels that are available, each with its own special perks. Silver members and up will get access to all of my extended cut TechHelp videos, one free beginner class each month, and more.
Gold members get access to download all of the sample databases that I build in my TechHelp videos, plus my code vault where I keep tons of different functions that I use. You'll also get a higher priority if you decide to submit any TechHelp questions to me, and you'll get one free Expert class each month after you've finished the beginner series.
Platinum members get all the previous perks, plus even higher priority for TechHelp questions, access to all of my full beginner courses for every subject, and one free Developer class each month after you've finished the Expert classes. These are the full-length courses found on my website, not just for Access. I also teach Word, Excel, Visual Basic, and lots more.
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Don't worry, these free TechHelp videos are going to keep coming. As long as you keep watching them, I'll keep making more, and they'll always be free.Quiz Q1. Why does Microsoft Access show a security warning when opening a database file downloaded from the internet?
A. To prevent unauthorized users from accessing your files
B. To stop database corruption caused by network issues
C. To protect users from potentially harmful content in files from untrusted sources
D. To ensure files are updated with the latest data
Q2. What is one way to avoid seeing the security warning every time you open a database?
A. Move the database to your Downloads folder
B. Add the database to the registry editor
C. Place the database file into a trusted folder/location
D. Only use the 64-bit version of Access
Q3. Where can you configure trusted locations in Microsoft Access if you have the full version?
A. Control Panel
B. Access Options > Trust Center > Trust Center Settings > Trusted Locations
C. Registry Editor
D. Access Database Tools tab
Q4. What should you avoid making your trusted folder for security reasons?
A. A folder on your C drive
B. The Desktop folder
C. The Downloads folder
D. The Documents folder
Q5. For users with only the Access Runtime version, how can you set up a trusted location?
A. Through Access Options menu
B. By editing the Windows Registry
C. By running as administrator
D. By compressing the database
Q6. What is the key value you must create in the registry to specify a trusted folder path?
A. DataSource
B. HomeDir
C. Path
D. Location
Q7. Which of the following is a correct registry path for Office 2019/365 trusted locations?
A. HKey_Local_Machine\\Windows\\CurrentVersion
B. HKey_Current_User\\Software\\Microsoft\\Office\\16.0\\Access\\Security\\Trusted Locations
C. HKey_Users\\System\\Access\\Trusted
D. HKey_Classes_Root\\Access\\Security\\16.0
Q8. What should you do before editing the Windows Registry?
A. Update your antivirus
B. Reboot your computer
C. Back up your computer and data
D. Disconnect from the internet
Q9. What string value name is required under the new registry key to define a trusted location?
A. Directory
B. Folder
C. Files
D. Path
Q10. Why is it necessary to end the folder path with a backslash (\\) when editing the registry for trusted locations?
A. It increases database performance
B. Windows requires it to identify folders, not files
C. It makes the path case-sensitive
D. It keeps subfolders hidden
Q11. If you want the trusted location to include subfolders, what else can you add in the registry key?
A. AllowSubfolders value
B. FileSecurity value
C. SubdirPermission value
D. EnableAllFolders value
Q12. What is a potential downside of manually editing the registry for each user in a business setting?
A. Changes are not permanent
B. It can only be done once per computer
C. You have to repeat the process on every workstation
D. It voids your Microsoft license
Q13. What automation option did the instructor mention for adding trusted locations on multiple machines?
A. Using Access macros
B. Distributing a Windows batch file
C. Creating a VBA button to update the registry
D. Reinstalling Office on every computer
Q14. Why should you only put trusted files into your trusted location?
A. Trusted folders are scanned less frequently for viruses
B. Files in trusted folders cannot be copied
C. Files in trusted folders bypass security warnings and could be potentially dangerous if untrusted
D. You cannot delete files from trusted folders
Answers: 1-C; 2-C; 3-B; 4-C; 5-B; 6-C; 7-B; 8-C; 9-D; 10-B; 11-A; 12-C; 13-C; 14-C
DISCLAIMER: Quiz questions are AI generated. If you find any that are wrong, don't make sense, or aren't related to the video topic at hand, then please post a comment and let me know. Thanks.Summary Today's video from Access Learning Zone covers how to set up a trusted location for your Microsoft Access databases, which helps eliminate those persistent security warnings, even if you do not have the full version of Access installed on your computer.
We start with a common issue. When you receive a database file from another source, such as an office download, opening it often triggers a yellow security warning bar at the top of the screen. This warning appears because, by default, Access disables all VBA code and active content in files that are not stored in a trusted folder. Even if you enable the content manually each time, this process quickly becomes frustrating.
To avoid this, you should set up a trusted folder on your computer where you keep all databases you know to be safe. I do not recommend making your downloads folder trusted, for security reasons, but you can create a specific folder just for your databases. For example, you might create a new folder right on your desktop called "Rix Trusted folder." Once this folder is created, open Access, go to Options, find the Trust Center, access Trusted Locations, and add your new folder there. You can even choose to trust any subfolders within it. After saving these settings, any database placed in your trusted folder will open without displaying those warning messages. Just make sure only databases from sources you trust—such as my site, where all files are vetted by me—are placed in this folder.
If you want a step-by-step walkthrough of this process, take a look at my Access Beginner Level 2 class, in which I demonstrate these steps in detail and discuss trusted folders further.
The second part of today's video is geared toward more advanced users and is based on a question about deploying databases to multiple users over a network, especially when those users are running the free runtime version of Access rather than the full version. When using the runtime, users cannot access the Trust Center directly, so they see the security warning every time they launch the database. While they can simply click to open the database anyway, it is possible to eliminate this annoyance by modifying the Windows registry.
Modifying the Windows registry to configure trusted locations for Access must be done with care. Always back up your database and your entire PC before proceeding, because mistakes in the registry can seriously affect your computer.
The Windows registry stores configuration settings for Windows and all installed applications. There is a particular section in the registry that defines trusted locations for Access. For Access 2019 and 365, this is usually under HKey Current User, Microsoft Office, 16.0, Access, Security, Trusted Locations. Here, each subkey represents a trusted folder. To set up a new trusted location, you create a new key under Trusted Locations, give it any name you like, and then add a string value named "Path" set to your desired folder location (remember to include a backslash at the end). Changes to the registry take effect immediately.
Once you have created your trusted folder on the C drive or wherever you choose, you can download or move your database files there, and the security warnings will disappear for those files. You will need to repeat this registry edit on every computer or user account where you wish to suppress the warning, especially across multiple machines in an office or a cloud-hosted environment.
If doing this manually on each PC sounds too time-consuming, you can also use VBA code to automate the process. You can create a button in your database interface that users click the first time they open the database, which will write the necessary registry keys automatically. This is safer and faster, especially for larger deployments. In the Extended Cut for today's lesson, I show you exactly how to use VBA to add a trusted folder to the registry and discuss best practices for automation and safety.
For more information about database deployment, the runtime edition of Access, and related topics, I have complete video tutorials available that walk you through splitting databases, encrypting the front end, and setting up shared environments.
You can find a complete video tutorial with step-by-step instructions on everything discussed here on my website at the link below. Live long and prosper, my friends.Topic List Understanding Microsoft Access security warnings
Creating a trusted folder for Access databases
Navigating to Access Trust Center settings
Adding a new trusted location in Access
Setting trusted location options and subfolders
Moving databases to trusted locations to remove warnings
Access Runtime edition and security notice issues
Overview of split databases for network users
Limitations of Trust Center access in runtime environments
Editing the Windows registry for trusted folders
Navigating through Windows Registry Editor
Creating new trusted location keys in the registry
Setting the Path value for trusted locations
Applying registry changes to remove Access warnings
Locating the correct file path for trusted folders
Implementing registry changes for cloud-hosted databases
Understanding registry edit precautions and system backup
Applying trusted location registry settings on multiple machines |
