A method for accessing liens on resources of distributed systems is provided. The method includes receiving an operation control request. The operation control request identifies a lien requestor, a resource of a distributed system, and at least one restricted operation for the resource of the distributed system. The method also includes associating an operation control lien with the resource of the distributed system based on the operation control request. The operation control lien identifies the lien requestor and the at least one restricted operation for the resource of the distributed system. The method further includes: receiving an operation request to execute a corresponding operation on the resource of the distributed system; determining that the corresponding operation of the operation request is a restricted operation identified by the operation control lien associated with the resource of the distributed system; and restricting execution of the corresponding operation of the operation request.