How To Eliminate 94% of Windows Vulnerabilities Easily - Comments Page 1

Leave it to Microsoft to make things as painful as possible to do what's best for us, the customer.
What a pain in the arse to have to do all of this and even then still sometimes get error messages about admin privileges anyway.
Disheartening.

Interesting ... and very slightly scary! I guess that starting to play with different accounts is something that most non-tech users don't usually do because they find it daunting & start to get a bit twitchy - "what if I mess it up and break the pc?" etc., leading to visions of backlogs of work and sheepish knocks on the doors of Tech Support and/or The Boss.

Can you give an example of what sort of thing a program/app might require administrator privileges for, please?

How about a set of instructions on how to change an account from Admin to User in W10? I'm not sure if the account my wife uses is A or U, will check when I get home. The A account is only logged on when needed.

Use a Chromebook or Linux Mint. Easy, safer, and fast.

I understand your reasons for using a user account for daily use instead of the admin account, BUT I don't want to have to enter a password every time I boot up: so, as far as being protected from Windows vulnerabilities is concerned, am I just as protected when I don't elect to use the password option when setting up the user account? (Not to mention, it's notoriously easy to bypass the user account login password requirement.)

I have a single user account, which has administrator privileges. Is there a simple way to move all the apps to a new account without admin privileges?

Will this method work on Windows XP? Yes, I'm still using that platform on my work station machines...if so, I will set up another user account and hope for the best.

I am using Windows 7. The new user I created does not have custom desktop features which my regular user id has. Is there a way to transfer a custom inertface from one user to another?

* "Eliminate 94%" -- from your headline
* "Neutralize more than 94%" -- from your first paragraph
* "Mitigates 93-94%" -- from your closing paragraph

The actual number doesn't matter, I suppose. But it goes to credibility. Is "94%" a number you made up? If not, how did you arrive at it? And why the variations above, ranging from "possibly less than 94%" to "exactly 94%" to "more than 94%"?

So many claims online are made up. ("Eighty-six percent of all statistics are made up, including this one.") Please don't tell me you do that, too!

Mac

I have a simpler way:

Enable the built in 'Administrator' account
Change your current account privilege to 'Standard'

To enable Administrator account search your computer for CMD then right click on it and run with administrator privileges.

they in the command prompt type:
net user administrator /active:yes

reboot and login to that account and give it a password in the 'user accounts' control panel

then logout and log back in to you other account and change the privilege to standard also in the 'user accounts' control panel.

Admin account gives the best shot at overcoming otherwise unsolvable Windows-permissions issues. Many tasks that can’t be completed via an admin-level user account or the run-as-administrator option will generally work in the Admin account

? Windows 8 like 10?

How do we access all our files and eMail from the original account?

Following Carl's and Peter Loppe's comments, the same problem continues in Windows 10. The ability to transfer settings from one account to another is imperative. I will not use another account, no matter how much safer, if I have to go through the process of personalizing it again--far too painful!

How can the settings be transferred so that everything remains the same except the user?

Use Danny G's idea.
Or create new administrator account, and then downgrade your own to user.

Is it not simpler just to create another account, select that account as admin? Then go to your regular admin account and change that back to 'standard'?...Seems too simple to work

I would like to try my suggestion above but ms has broken 'System Restore' in the last few weeks, so I do not need a software issue that I can not undo/correct.

Phew! Nice article although I haven't done it yet on my Windows 10 to test how easy it is. I just wanted to know why you spelled Phew the wrong way 'Whew'. When you say Phew it sounds like few NOT woo. You are not the only American I have seen, spelling it that way. Please don't let another American error creep into the English language (stands back awaits all the Yank protests) - [Smiley Face] to diffuse those protests

A good idea for new computers, I tried setting a new user on an existing windows 7. Nightmare trying to move working apps to new user. Back to using the admin user, security is great, but first I need to be able to get work done. Keeping people out of the safe is desired, but not at the time expense involved with myself not being able to get into the safe.

I just did this, convinced, scared, by the info.

The first thing that happens is user account control wants you to provide an admin login. I didn't know what to do. So I said 'no' to that.

Next this is you realise this means running a completely new account, of course.

So your desktop will be different, new and anything you've installed for 'this user only' will not be available to the new account.

This is the first ten minutes for me. Okay so far.

What I would prefer is to run my own admin account without the admin privileges and be able to switch them on with a click.

Plenty of advice on the web about how to enable aldmin rights when you want them. None I can find about how to give them away for a while...

Update --- As noted in the comments, use Danny G's idea. Adding a new Admin and then changing the original Admin to user keeps all functions and settings with the new safe user account. Thanks Bob and Danny.

Thanks very much, Bob. Very helpful information once again!