How to fix “You require permission from SYSTEM to make changes to this file” (or folder)

“You require permission from SYSTEM to make changes to this file” (or folder) – Note that this article was originally written for Windows 7 but it’s the same for Windows 10 and Windows 11.

That annoying message seems to bug me (and a few other people on the net) quite a lot. It happened when I tried to delete a folder in my Games drive (not sure who created the folder in the first place). Apart from Windows making your computer to wake up from sleep by itself, this is another issue frequently encountered by many.

You require permission from SYSTEM

With this issue, it seems that the permissions got mixed up as I reformatted my Windows 7 and moved things around. Here is how to fix “You require permission from SYSTEM to make changes to this file” or “you require permission from system to make changes to this folder” on Windows 7 even when you are already an Administrator.

  1. Right click on the folder (or file) what you want to delete which has this annoying problem – choose Properties.
  2. Go to “Security” tab – “Advanced”.
  3. Go to “Owner” tab – “Edit”
    Owner tab
  4. On the “Change owner to:”, click on the username you are using at the moment and then tick the “Replace owner on subcontainers and objects”. Press OK to save and keep pressing OK until you close all the windows.
  5. Again, do a right click on the folder/file – then choose Properties.
  6. Again, Go to “Security” tab – “Advanced”.
  7. On the “Permissions” tab (where you should be now), go to “Change Permissions”.
    Change Permissions
  8. Keep the “Include inheritable permissions from this object’s parent” unchecked BUT check the “Replace all child object permissions with inheritable permissions from this object”.
    Tick boxes
  9. Press “OK” to confirm and “Yes” on the pop-up window:
    Windows Security
  10. Keep pressing “OK” until you close all the pop-up windows.
  11. Now delete the file/folder with the “You require permission from SYSTEM to make changes to this file” issue.
  12. Say goodbye to it ;)

Hope this fix works for you as it’s a really annoying Windows permission issue. No more “you require permission from system to make changes to this folder” annoying message to see!

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