Question :
I am trying to open a JPG-picture in Preview.app, but I get this error : “the file couldn’t be opened because you don’t have permission to view it“
What can I do ?
Answer :
It isn’t clear why you get this error message, but the way to fix it is rather simple :
- first, Quit the Preview.app if it is open :
- press the [CMD]+[Q] key-combo on your keyboard
- then reopen the Preview.app
- then Force Quit the Preview.app :
- press the [CMD]+[ALT]+[ESC] key-combo on your keyboard
- when the new window opens, select Preview (the app) from the scroll-list
- then click on the Force Quit button (bottom-right)
- then reopen the Preview.app
- now, the JPG files should open in Preview.app without a problem
That’s it !
enjoy 😉
MacManus.nl 
I have been trying for 3 hours to work out how to do that – Thank you for info. It worked.
However – for me it only seems to work once. It will open the one file that I couldn’t open but then it will go back to saying the same thing. Even on the same file.
@DPC :
Great to hear !
Thanks for the feedback !
As mentioned, it is not clear what exactly causes Preview to produce this error, so trying to fix the file using Preview.app may not work.
I figure that opening the file in another app that is able the read the file-format and then saving it again under a different name might fix the file.
Hope this helps !
enjoy 😉