password protect a file

Create a password protected disk image and put it in that. Make sure you turn off show password in keychain.

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1578

I found a nifty tip to encrypt a zip file that is built into OSX. The only issue is you have to use the command line (Terminal) which may be more than some people want to deal with. If you don’t mind a little tinkering here is how you can encrypt your files to an encrypted zip without buying any other program or using an OSX disk image.

1. Open up a Terminal window (the Terminal command line program is a little to techie for some)
2. Navigate, using "cd", to the directory where the file you what to make an encrypted zip file is.
3. Type:

zip -e SecretEncryptedFile.zip FileToEncrypt.txt

Note: the man pages have more than you ever wanted to know about the zip command: "man zip"

To unencrypt the new file simply double click on the file and type the password from the finder. I have also unencrypted the files on a PC which is really nice for sharing with others.

Hi,

I have been through all the stages of creating a password protected disk image and am still struggling with protecting a file - it is a .txt file in this case. I get to the point where I create the protected disk image, and then put in a password. Nothing comes up when I do this, so I've opened it up through finder, where it comes up under 'devices', and attempted to place my selected .txt file 'within' in on the blank window, and hoped that would work. However, when I 'sign out' from this disk image (forgive my terminology, I'm no computer expert) using the 'eject' symbol on finder (which appears to protect the file as it is no longer immediately accessible) though it seems to block access to my .txt file as desired all I need to do is search it on the computer and the file comes up straight away and is accessible without a password. Am I missing anything here? All help appreciated.

Thanks,

John