Admin Account setup

  • Thread starter Thread starter Guest
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Guest

During windows xp setup - at the point you are asked to supply an admin account password there is a tick box for encrypt.
Does anyone know what this does? or where there is more information?

many thanks
 
As the option suggests an encryption algorithm is applied to the password file making it more difficult to read the password from
it.

The password file already uses an encryption algorithm but the problem is the standard one is so well known you can find a program
to decrypt it in under 30 seconds using an internet search, it isn't exactly secure. The one you enable using the encrypt option
uses a user defined key to encrypt the file thus someone wanting to view the contents of the file would need not only the code to
decrypt the file but also the key you used to encrypt it.

You'll find more information on this using windows help, the MS knowledgebase and also by looking at the security articles starting
from this page http://www.microsoft.com/canada/smallbiz/securedependabledesktop/default.mspx


--
Dale Beaudette

Associate Expert
The Expert Zone
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/expertzone/default.asp
 
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