Folders stuck with the properties of the "safe mode"?

Hi :) I found this place dedicated to windows 7 [so far the version of windows that I like the most]. I hope you can help me in this weird problem. It's hard to explain so I will try explain my myself the best as I can.

My laptop got a virus, so before erasing the entire hard drive I needed make a copy of my files. All my files are in a folder with many subfolders so it was easy to copy all of them. For making the copy I used Teracopy. The laptop was pretty unstable, it was randomly restarting after some hours. So, to make the copy of all of my files I used the safe mode. Today I finally finished erasing the hard drive, reinstalling all my drivers, programs and getting all my files back to the hard drive of the laptop.
All seemed to be ok but after creating some new documents and downloading new ones, I place them into my big folder [with the files that were backed up]. And a small icon of a padlock appeared in one of the corners of the new file. After making a big research and trying several things I noticed that there was nothing wrong with the new files [or the old ones]. If I make a new folder replacing the folder that was made from the safe mode, the padlocks were no longer visible.
I spoke with a friend that told me that, all the folders created in the safe mode where created with the properties of the safe mode.
No matter what I do with the security options of the old folders, nothing happens. The only way, is to cut and paste the old files to a new folder made on the the desktop or on "My Documents" [for example] and deleting the old folder and replace it with the new folder I just created.
I don't want to replace one by one all the old folders by new ones, basically because I have hundreds of folders [almost 1T].
I really hope someone has a practical solution for this inconvenient situation that I'm experiencing.

Kind regards. :)

Thank you for the answer! :)

I already saw that link, but my case is different because is just with the folder from my back up the one with issues.


I have continued doing my research and found that I have to delete users form the security list.

Here I show you the difference between a "good folder" vs a "bad folder" from my back up, is in Spanish but I wrote the meaning of each thing.



I read that I need to delete those users that are labeled "primary object" but the option to delete them is inactive.

Ztruker said:

Enable the hidden Administrator Account.

Open a elevated command prompt
type net user administrator /active:yes and press Enter
close command prompt

Restart computer then start tapping F8 every second or so until you ghet the Advanced Boot Options menu.
Select Safe Mode
Login as Admninistrator

Try removing the accounts from here.

Thanks for your assistance!

I just discovered if I zip/rar a folder with the issue, and decompress it; it returns to normal and the s' on the icons of the files are gone!

I hope this works with all the folders from the backup

For anyone with the same problem, just rar the folder with the issue "Add to archive..." and when you decompress the folder, the problem will be no more!

Thank you Ztruker for the assistance

Ztruker said:

That's really the same as copying the folder and renaming it.

Surprisingly that also works as you said!

Thanks!!! That will make mi work a lot faster to solve the problem with all my folders and subfolders


Thanks Ztruker!