- Jun 4, 2015
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As we all know, Windows 95, 98 and ME are notorious for letting users simply bypass the login screen with the click of a cancel button. Since Windows 9x doesn't support NTFS, you cannot set permissions on files and folders, thus allowing anyone to just cancel the login and steal your files.
There is a solution to prevent someone from bypassing the login screen on Windows 9x.
Note: This WILL NOT WORK if your machine is not set to logon to a domain. You must have a Windows NT or Windows 2K/2K3 domain controller for this to work. Using this trick without a domain controller will result in you being locked out of the OS, since you cannot logon locally on Windows 9x when set to logon to a domain.
1. Go to start -> Run and type regedit at the prompt.
2. Navigate to HKLM -> Network -> Logon
3. Create a new DWORD value and name it MustBeValidated. (If this key already exists, skip to the next step.)
4. Open the key and set the value to 1.
5. Restart your computer.
When you click cancel, you should see an error message that reads:
"The network could not validate your user name. You cannot use Windows, unless your user name is validated by the network. Make sure you typed everything correctly, or contact your administrator."
If you see this error, users now cannot cancel their way out of logging on. However, this does not prevent a user from booting into DOS and accessing the drive contents that way. The only way to fix that is to convert to an NTFS drive.
This trick is pretty much useless nowadays, since nobody uses Windows 9x anymore, but if you happen to have a Windows 9x machine that logs on to a domain and you don't want your friends bypassing the login screen, it can come in handy. You can also use this trick in safe mode if you acquire a retired machine, say from a school district, that has this policy enabled. Just go to the same place in the registry editor and set the value mentioned above to 0.
There is a solution to prevent someone from bypassing the login screen on Windows 9x.
Note: This WILL NOT WORK if your machine is not set to logon to a domain. You must have a Windows NT or Windows 2K/2K3 domain controller for this to work. Using this trick without a domain controller will result in you being locked out of the OS, since you cannot logon locally on Windows 9x when set to logon to a domain.
1. Go to start -> Run and type regedit at the prompt.
2. Navigate to HKLM -> Network -> Logon
3. Create a new DWORD value and name it MustBeValidated. (If this key already exists, skip to the next step.)
4. Open the key and set the value to 1.
5. Restart your computer.
When you click cancel, you should see an error message that reads:
"The network could not validate your user name. You cannot use Windows, unless your user name is validated by the network. Make sure you typed everything correctly, or contact your administrator."
If you see this error, users now cannot cancel their way out of logging on. However, this does not prevent a user from booting into DOS and accessing the drive contents that way. The only way to fix that is to convert to an NTFS drive.
This trick is pretty much useless nowadays, since nobody uses Windows 9x anymore, but if you happen to have a Windows 9x machine that logs on to a domain and you don't want your friends bypassing the login screen, it can come in handy. You can also use this trick in safe mode if you acquire a retired machine, say from a school district, that has this policy enabled. Just go to the same place in the registry editor and set the value mentioned above to 0.
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