Information Technology Corner

Advice and commentary on the Good, the Bad and the Ugly of IT & Internet. ============================================================

Today's Topic:Why you should be aware of  the privilege of  your computer account?

What is the privilege of the computer logon account you use for daily computing? Or, if your computer logs on automatically, what is the name of the logon account and what is its privilege?

This is a crucial questions that are often overlooked.

The reason it is important is, if you're on the Internet, your computer is  invariably one of millions of connected computers. It can therefore be accessed by an unauthorized persons with very little effort and know-how.

Account types and privileges include: Guest, Standard User, Power User, Administrator etc depending on your operating system ( Windows 2000, XP or Vista). Therefore the higher the privilege of the account you're logged with i.e. Administrator, the more extensive the access for anyone else who manages to access your computer.

In other words, if you're logged in with high privilege account, there is no limit to what an intruder can do on your computer e.g. delete files, or programs, install spyware or even infect the computer with viruses.

The trick is to do your day-to-day computing using the guest or some other low privileged account. Use administrator level account only for installing programs and devices and once completed, log out.

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