WD Lesson - 28

Understanding User Accounts

• A user account is a record that consists of all the information that defines a user.
• It includes the user name and password required for the user to log on and the rights and permissions the user has for using the computer and network and accessing their resources.

Understanding User Accounts

Windows Server 2003 provides three types of user accounts:

i) Local User Accounts

Local user accounts allow users to log on and gain access to resources on, only the computers where the local user account is created.

ii) Domain User Accounts

Domain user accounts allow users to log on to a domain and gain access to resources

anywhere on the network.

iii) Built-In User Accounts

Built-in user accounts are created automatically for the purpose of performing administrative task or to gain access to network resources. Two very common examples are:

a) Administrator

The built-in administrator account is used to manage the overall computer and domain

configuration.

b) Guest

The built-in Guest account is to provide users who do not have an account in the domain with the ability to log on and gain access to resources.

LOCAL USER VS DOMAIN USER

i)                    Access: A local user account has access to the resources of a specific computer only where as a domain user has access to the resources of whole domain.

ii)                  Security: In a local user account security database is in the local computer only, where as a domain user account has centralized security.

iii)                Replication: A local user account doesn’t replicate to domain controller, where as a domain user account gets replicated to domain controller.

 

User Password

·         To protect access to the domain or a computer, every user account should have a strong password.

·         A strong password is a password that provides an effective defence against unauthorized access to a resource.

·         Password can be up to 127 characters. However Microsoft windows XP operating system should use maximum of /4 characters.

Strong password requirements

■ Is at least seven characters long.

■ Does not contain a user name, real name, or company name.

■ Does not contain a complete dictionary word.

■ Is significantly different from previous passwords. Passwords that increment

   (Password1, Password2, Password3 ...) are not strong.

■ Contains characters from each of the following four groups shown below

Uppercase letters                               A, B, C ...

Lowercase letters                               a, b, c ...

Numerals                                            0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9

Symbols found on the keyboard          ` ~ ! @ # $ % ^ & * ( ) _ + - = { } | [ ] \ : “; ‘ < > ? , . /

An example of a strong password is K*c6mr93}D.