How to password protect your BIOS settings?
BIOS (Basic Input Output Subsystem) is a programmable chip that controls how information is passed to various devices in the computer system. It is often accessed for changing boot priority. A typical method to access the BIOS settings screen is to press ESC, F1, F2, F10 or DEL at computer first startup screen.
BIOS settings allow you to run a boot priority from a floppy drive, a hard drive, a CD-ROM drive or an external device. Unauthorized users can boot the computer from windows password reset disk easily through BIOS to remove the password to blank.
To protect a computer’s configuration, a computer must have its BIOS password-protected and set its hard disk as the first boot device.
Below operation will show you how to create a BIOS password (also called supervisor password) on computer.
Procedures for setting supervisor password:
1. Power on computer;
2. Press F2 or other keys to enter BIOS settings;
3. Select Security tab with arrow keys, choose Set Supervisor Password and press Enter key;
4. Input password and confirm password as the wizard;
5. Save all changes and log out BIOS screen by pressing F10 key;
Note:
The BIOS interface may be different based on motherboards, you may find Password tab instead of Security tab.
You may set user password or power-on password here as well.
In this way, no one can access your BIOS to change setup of the computers most sensitive areas without correct password.
How to enable password complexity in MS Office 2010
By enabling password complexity requirement in Windows, you can make Windows password recovery more difficult for intruders, and thus better secure your system. To achieve the similar purpose, you can enforce password complexity in MS Office as well.
With Registry, you can control all password rules for MS office, including enable password complexity.
Attention: It is said that password complexity cannot be enforced for Microsoft 2007 Office system encryption.
If you are using Office 2010, please do the following steps:
Step 1 Type regedit in Run box, and press enter. Go to the below location.
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\14.0\Common\Security\PasswordComplexity
Step 2 Create a DWORD(32-bit) value, name it as PolicyLevel, and set value data from 0,1,2, and 3. You’d better fill the box with 2 or 3.
0 is for no complexity (default), 1 for minimum length, 2 for minimum length plus requiring 3 from 4 character groups (lowercase a-z, uppercase A-Z, digits 0-9, or non-alphabetic character), and 3 for all these checks plus at least 6 characters.
Step 3 Do the same steps to create a DWORD(32-bit) value named MinLength, and then set a number of minimum length. It is suggested to fill the box with 6.
From then on, when you set a password in Office 2010, the system will verify whether it fits password complexity or not.
Warning: Remember your Office password carefully, thus you will never be bothered by Office password recovery.
Enable Windows 7 Password History Enforcement
What is password history? Why enable password history enforcement?
According to Microsoft, Password history determines the number of unique new passwords that have to be associated with and used by a user before an old password can be reused again. It means the password you have used cannot be used again until you have used other passwords. In this way, every time you should reset windows 7 password to a new one. Therefore, enable administrators to enhance security.
Before reusing the same password, the number of other passwords is between 0 and 24. By default, 24 is for domain controllers. 0 is for stand-alone servers.
The below steps will show you how to enforce password history in windows 7.
Option 1 Through Local Security Policy Manager
Step 1 Type Local Security Policy in start search box, and press enter.
Step 2 Local Security Policy editor will appear. In the left pane, expand console tree Account Policies -> Password Policy. In right pane, double click Enforce password history option.
Step 3 Enter a number between 1 and 24 that you want remembered before users can reuse a password, to enable password history for all users then click on OK.
Option 2 Through a Elevated Command Prompt
1. Type cmd in start search box, right click it to select run as administrator, to open command prompt.
2. To disable password history for all users, in command prompt, type the command “net accounts /uniquepw:0” and press Enter.
To enable password history for all users, in command prompt, type the command “net accounts /uniquepw:x” (replace x with a number between 1 and 24), press Enter.
3. Close command prompt.
These procedures can also be applied on Windows Vista and Windows XP.
The user guide of Problem Steps Recorder in Windows 7
When your friend need help to make some settings in Windows 7, it is quite troublesome to write down the steps in text to teach him. If you know how to use the Problem Steps Recorder (PSR) in Windows 7, it is quite easy and time–saving to record the steps exactly and automatically by PSR.
For example, to show users how to reset Windows 7 password in Control Panel, you can use the Problem Steps Recorder as follows:
Before start, do practice if need be, to make sure you remember the steps in avoid of wrong operations.
1. Click Start, immediately type psr, and press Enter.
2. Click Start Record.
3. Do Windows 7 password reset in Control Panel.
4. During recording, if you want to make comments for a certain operation, click Add Comment. Then the recording pauses, and a box appears at the bottom of the screen for you to highlight the problematic location and write down your notes. Click OK to continue recording.
5. When the recording is done. Click Stop Recorder. PSR responds with the Save As dialog box.
6. Type a name for the file (it’s a regular Zip file) and click Save.
7. Open the zip file and double-click the MHT file inside.
The recording appears as a series of snapshots, along with detailed step description in plain English. It can be viewed as a slide show as well.
View the MHT file to verify the following:
- The steps are accurately described.
- There is no information or any screenshots that you do not want others to see.
8. Send the file to your friend.
Besides solving problem for others, you could record the difficulty you face with Problem Steps Recorder as well, to ask for a solution for your problem.