Don't take this the wrong way, but why are you using .zip files? The better way to do it would be with tar: tar cvjf thief-be-found.tar.gz /etc/event.d/banana /usr/sbin/sms* Which would package them all up in a friendly manner so a user can unpack with this: tar xvjf thief-be-found.tar.gz -C / No need for changing directories or chmod.