Limited User Account has too much access to computer

Hello to anyone with the knowledge!
I'm using XP Home Svc pack 2. My first problem is that I would like the
access of more folders to be restricted to limited user accounts on my
computer. I don't understand why in the sharing tab (under properties) of
some folders I can check "make this folder private" and in other folders,
this is not checkable or uncheckable. I would think that any folder on the
Administrator's account should be denied access to a Limited account, not
just the Administrator's My Docs folder.

My second problem and the reason why I'm here is that I have an external
hard drive connected by USB. I can go into the Guest user account, and have
total access to that external hard drive. Is there a way for the
Administrator to block access to this or any other connected device that
shows up in My Computer? If not, then why not? This seems to be a very basic
and important feature of having multiple user accounts on one shared machine.

I do not want to encrypt the contents of my external hard drive, nor do I
want to unplug the drive and lock it up somewhere every time I leave the
computer.

Thank you for your time.

Steve

Anteaus
Sun Jul 20 04:16:00 PDT 2008

XP Home has only limited control over what users can access, and is not
officially designed to allow you to either set NTFS permissions direcly, or
create non-administrator users. There are hacks to allow this, but if it
breaks as a result... you get to keep both pieces.

Home doesn't allow data encryption, either. Though I have reservations about
using EFS in any case, owing to the number of reports of lost data. It's
probably OK in the hands of a trained Admin, but for a home user who doesn't
understand the key-management aspects it's messing with C4.

Options are to upgrade to Pro, or to use a third-party product such as
Truecrypt.
http://truecrypt.org

"SteveParks" wrote:

> Hello to anyone with the knowledge!
> I'm using XP Home Svc pack 2. My first problem is that I would like the
> access of more folders to be restricted to limited user accounts on my
> computer. I don't understand why in the sharing tab (under properties) of
> some folders I can check "make this folder private" and in other folders,
> this is not checkable or uncheckable. I would think that any folder on the
> Administrator's account should be denied access to a Limited account, not
> just the Administrator's My Docs folder.
>
> My second problem and the reason why I'm here is that I have an external
> hard drive connected by USB. I can go into the Guest user account, and have
> total access to that external hard drive. Is there a way for the
> Administrator to block access to this or any other connected device that
> shows up in My Computer? If not, then why not? This seems to be a very basic
> and important feature of having multiple user accounts on one shared machine.
>
> I do not want to encrypt the contents of my external hard drive, nor do I
> want to unplug the drive and lock it up somewhere every time I leave the
> computer.
>
> Thank you for your time.
>
> Steve

SteveParks
Thu Jul 24 22:41:00 PDT 2008

thanks, this helps!

"Anteaus" wrote:

> XP Home has only limited control over what users can access, and is not
> officially designed to allow you to either set NTFS permissions direcly, or
> create non-administrator users. There are hacks to allow this, but if it
> breaks as a result... you get to keep both pieces.
>
> Home doesn't allow data encryption, either. Though I have reservations about
> using EFS in any case, owing to the number of reports of lost data. It's
> probably OK in the hands of a trained Admin, but for a home user who doesn't
> understand the key-management aspects it's messing with C4.
>
> Options are to upgrade to Pro, or to use a third-party product such as
> Truecrypt.
> http://truecrypt.org
>
> "SteveParks" wrote:
>
> > Hello to anyone with the knowledge!
> > I'm using XP Home Svc pack 2. My first problem is that I would like the
> > access of more folders to be restricted to limited user accounts on my
> > computer. I don't understand why in the sharing tab (under properties) of
> > some folders I can check "make this folder private" and in other folders,
> > this is not checkable or uncheckable. I would think that any folder on the
> > Administrator's account should be denied access to a Limited account, not
> > just the Administrator's My Docs folder.
> >
> > My second problem and the reason why I'm here is that I have an external
> > hard drive connected by USB. I can go into the Guest user account, and have
> > total access to that external hard drive. Is there a way for the
> > Administrator to block access to this or any other connected device that
> > shows up in My Computer? If not, then why not? This seems to be a very basic
> > and important feature of having multiple user accounts on one shared machine.
> >
> > I do not want to encrypt the contents of my external hard drive, nor do I
> > want to unplug the drive and lock it up somewhere every time I leave the
> > computer.
> >
> > Thank you for your time.
> >
> > Steve