i have created a lan and have made 3 workgroups. how can i make one workgroup secure from other?

Question

i want that on accessing shared files over network, it should prompt for password.
or
one workgroup can not access the shared data of other workgroup.

Answer 1

Workgroups aren't a security thing, they are just a way of grouping a few machines under a logical naming convention.

Workgroups don't have security groups, all accounts are local.

If you want to grant a user on a different machine access to a file share on your machine, create them a local account on your machine. Restrict the share to the local accounts on your machine that are to be given access. They'll then be prompted for a username & password. They then enter the details for the local account on your machine.

It's much easier to create a domain, rather than workgroups.

Everyuser then has a domain account created & all machines are made members of the domain. You can also create domain groups & grant domain accounts membership of those groups as you see fit.

When a share is then created on any member workstation, permissions can be granted according to group membership or particular accounts.

Answer 2

Workgroups are not designed to do what you want and they cannot be set to do this.

If you have a domain (client / server) you can achieve what you want.

Another option is a network share drive that you put on your peer - peer network. Each user is configured on the network drive and placed in a group. The users can access their own group's files and any "available to all" classified files.