Hidden user account in XP Pro

  • Thread starter Thread starter billW1701
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billW1701

Hi, this is a new one to me and I would like to know if
anyone else has come across this.

I downloaded and ran an advance process viewer. I am at
work now and did this at home so I don't remember which
one. While getting a feel for the program I noticed that
there was what appeared to be a "hidden" user account. The
account name is 5.5.5.5. and a string of numbers. It seems
to have administration level access. Any ideas? Is this
hidden account a normal feature of XP Pro Sp1? Or is there
an uninveted guest on my PC?
 
Windows XP, both Home Edition and Professional have a hidden Administrator
account. It is something of a "super administrator" designed for functions
such as accessing user accounts or changing passwords, etc. when normal
access for some reason is denied (corrupted profile, forgotten password,
etc.), usually you should rarely need to use it and you should use the
administrator account you created for most administrative functions. You
might call the hidden account a safety net.
 
Thank you,
With all the recent hijacks, worms and whatever, I was
afraid that I'd been hacked.
Though, I don't know how because I run a good firewall and
keep everything as up to date as possible.

Thanks again.
Bill
 
You're welcome.

Your concern was perfectly understandable.
 
How do you log in as this "super admin user?" How do retrieve or repair a
corrupt user profile? Please.
Thanks.
Robert
 
If you have XP Pro, hit ctrl-alt-delete at the welcome, then select the ID
called Administrator, leave the password blank assuming you didn't create
one for this account during setup, most don't, and press enter. If you
don't see an ID called Administrator, type it in, then leave the password
blank and press enter.

In Home Edition, you would have to perform Administrator functions from Safe
Mode.

Check the following Knowledge Base Article for help with a corrupt user
profile:
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;q318011
 
On my computer with XP Home, there's a (hidden) account called
something-something ASP.NET (sorry about the lack of a name, but I haven't
got access to the computer for a while). By the way, hidden means it's not
on the welcome screen - it shows up in user accounts.

Any way, since it ends with .NET, is this a microsoft account? I'm not very
comfortable with the idea of this user - no password, although I changed it
to a limited account to be safe - sitting on my computer. So, can I delete
it or not? I'm not a programmer or anything like that, and the closest I've
come to .NET is installing the framework 1.1 a while back (though it was
already there).
 
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