Hack58.Disable Skype File Transfer

Hack 58. Disable Skype File Transfer

Perhaps corporate policy dictates it, or perhaps you just think it's a good idea. In any event, disabling Skype's file-transfer function requires only a single registry setting.

Works with: Windows version of Skype.

With the release of version 1.4 for Windows, Skype included the ability to disable file transfer selectively. In many businesses, disabling this function may be dictated by corporate policy, or it might be at the request of your network administrator. Provided you're willing to hack the Windows registry, selectively disabling file transfer is a snap.

Open RegEdit (select Start Run…, enter "RegEdit," and press Return or click OK) and add this key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Policies\Skype\Phone. Under this key, add a new DWORD value having the name DisableFileTransfer. Setting DisableFileTransfer to 1 will disable Skype file transfer (see Figure 5-23), and setting it to 0 (or omitting or deleting the key altogether) will leave file transfer enabled. Note that you dont have to stop and restart Skype for this change to take effect.

Figure 5-23. The pop-up window you will see if Skype file transfer is disabled

Of course, this hack works sensibly only when regular user accounts are set up so that they can't edit the registry under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE themselves; that is, specifically, they should not be able to change DisableFileTransfer.

5.8.1. Hacking the Hack

If you don't want to hack this registry setting yourself, or if you have to roll Skype out across a large number of machines, you might find the following VBScript (disable_file_transfer.vbs) helpful:

 ' File: disable_file_transfer.vbs Dim objShell Set objShell = WScript.CreateObject("WScript.Shell") objShell.RegWrite "HKLM\Software\Policies\Skype\Phone\DisableFileTransfer", _                    1, "REG_DWORD" 

Here is the opposite (enable_file_transfer.vbs), just in case the policy that prohibits file transfer changes:

 ' File: enable_file_transfer.vbs Dim objShell Set objShell = WScript.CreateObject("WScript.Shell") objShell.RegWrite "HKLM\Software\Policies\Skype\Phone\DisableFileTransfer", _                    0, "REG_DWORD" 

Note that both scripts will, if necessary, create the registry entry if it does not exist already.