Lock Google Chrome with a Password
This article teaches you how to password-protect your Google Chrome browser on a computer. Locking Google Chrome will prevent anyone who doesn't have your Google account password from being able to use the Google Chrome browser at all.
Contents
Steps
Enabling the Password Lock
- Open the Google Chrome browser. It's the red, green, yellow, and blue circle icon.
- Make sure you're signed into your Gmail account. If you aren't, you'll need to click the person-shaped icon on the top right side of the Google Chrome window, click Sign In, and enter your Google Account credentials.
- Your email address must end in "@gmail.com" for the password lock to work.
- Open Chrome's Experimental Features page. To do this, type chrome://flags/ into your browser's URL bar at the top of the Chrome window, then tap ↵ Enter.
- Don't edit any values on this page other than the one described.
- Locate the "New profile management system" option. This is easiest to do by holding down Ctrl (or ⌘ Command if you're using a Mac) and tapping F to open the "Find" field, then typing "profile management system" into the provided field.
- Make sure profile management is enabled. The box below the "New profile management system" text should say "Enabled"; if it doesn't, click the box and select Enabled from its drop-down menu.
- Exit and restart Chrome. Your changes should have taken place, meaning you're ready to proceed with adding a password lock to your Google Chrome browser.
Adding a Password Lock to Chrome
- Click ⋮. It's in the top right corner of your Google Chrome window.
- Click Settings. You'll find this toward the bottom of the drop-down menu here.
- Scroll down and click Add Person. This is under the "People" heading toward the bottom of the page.
- Make sure the Enable Guest browsing and Let anyone add a person to Chrome boxes are both unchecked.
- Type in a name for your new user. This is completely optional, since you won't be using the account in question.
- Click the box at the bottom left corner of the window. This box should say "Control and view the websites this person visits from (your email address)." Doing so will allow you to apply a child lock to your own account when you're not using it.
- You can un-check the Create a desktop shortcut for this user box.
- If you see a prompt that says "Your account sign in details are out of date. Sign in again", you'll need to sign into your Google account to continue.
- Click Add. This will create your secondary supervised account.
- Click OK, got it. It's important that you don't switch over to the other account, since your Google account is the one that can lock your browser.
- Click your name tab. It's to the left of the Minimize button in the top right corner of the page.
- Click Exit and Childlock. It's at the bottom of the drop-down menu here. This will lock your Google Chrome browser down so that no one can use Google Chrome without first entering your account password.
- Simply clicking the Exit button in the top right corner of the Chrome page will not lock your browser.
Tips
- Choose-a-Secure-Password. A short password or a one-word password can easily be cracked.
- Email accounts that work through Gmail but end in a different extension (e.g., ".edu") or have different domain names (e.g., "wikihow") won't allow you to lock down your browser.
Warnings
- If you forget your password while the child lock is engaged, you'll need to reset it before you can continue.
