System Policies for Password applet of Control Panel

The article is dedicated to the System Policies for the Password applet of Control Panel for Windows 95, 98, ME.

Passwords in the common sense resemble the key and the lock and, when humankind begot the division to the native and the strange, there appeared the problem of authentication. The password management is inseparable part of any system security rules and simultaneously the main target for the computer malefactors.

The system policies for Windows 95, 98 and ME, destined for the restriction of the accessible for the user actions in Passwords applet, which is located in Control Panel are represented in this article. The Password applet has three pages: "Change Passwords", "Remote Administration" and "User Profiles". The "Remote Administration" page will appear after the installation of the relevant services. The "Change Passwords" tab contains the controls: "Change Windows" and "Change other Passwords". The "Remote Administration" tab is used for enabling and further managing the "Remote administration". The customised (personal) preferences for the different users for the Desktop, Network Neighbourhood, Start menu and Programs menus can be enabled on the "User Profiles" page. The below-given system policies were designed for single-user, or how it went in fashion to name: "client", Windows systems. I do not intentionally introduce the detailed descriptions for the functions or purposes of these or others settings of "User Profiles" or "Remote Administration" in order not to go away from the topic of Password administration in Windows 9.x. The Passwords management in Windows NT or 2000 is also out of this article topic.

All the policies given in the article have a lot of common features. All of them are Boolean, in other words, can have only two states. They have the scope of the Current User only, and all are stored in the HKEY_CURRENT_USER system registry hive. The values corresponding to their states are numeric (DWORD) and can be equal to "1", enabling the policy and to "0", disabling it. The policies are absent in the system by default. If there is no corresponding value in the system registry, this is equivalent to the "0" and disables the policy. All the policies are stored in "Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System" key.

Disable Passwords in Control Panel

This policy, stored in "NoSecCPL" value, prohibits from launching the Passwords applet in Control Panel, thus, protecting from changing the system settings concerned with the system security. While making an attempt to access there appears the message that the system administrator restricted the Passwords applet.

Hide Change Passwords Page

The state of this policy is stored in the "NoPwdPage" value. When the policy is in enabled state, the access to the "Change Passwords" page is closed. This page is removed from the Passwords applet and Windows passwords can not be changed through this applet in Control Panel.

Hide Remote Administration Page

The value "NoAdminPage" responds for the hiding of the "Remote Administration" page. If the policy is enabled, there is no access to "Remote Administration" page, since the page is removed from the Passwords applet and it will be impossible to change the settings through the applet in Control Panel.

Hide User Profiles Page

The value "NoProfilePage", being equal to "1", turns this policy to the enabled state and the "User Profiles" page is removed from the Passwords applet. Thus, the applet using to change "User Profiles" settings is forbidden.

The implementation in Activity and Authentication Analyzer

In order to see the state of above-mentioned policies or to manipulate them in Activity and Authentication Analyzer follow in the left navigation pane next way:

Computer Administration then Control Panel, Passwords item after this, and find in the right list items corresponding to these policies named:

• Disable Passwords in Control Panel
• Hide Change Passwords Page
• Hide Remote Administration Page
• Hide User Profiles Page