Re: Local Administrator Account & Corporate Network



jeffh wrote:
> We currently have all our users as local administrators. A couple
> of years ago we attempted to restrict our desktops, but fail short
> due to particular applications requiring local permissions while
> the user themselves were logged in.
>
> We continue to fall flat when applications we do not want
> installed, example: Google Toolbars, google earth, and Google
> search (most recent events).
>
> The problem is that there are several web-based applications that
> are used throughout our office that require installing plug-ins,
> Palm devices that require administrator permissions to install, and
> other situations where the past attempt failed.
>
> The Run As does not always seem to be a valid option. Programs like
> the palm will write several entries under HKCU, so logging into the
> workstation as admin is not an option.
>
> I have made several forum posts where people have question why we
> are using Administrator permissions on our workstation. Am I
> missing something here?

Very few applications (if any) truly need full administrative rights to
*run*.

Sure - they may need write permission to a select directory or three.. They
may even need certain special rights to some registry keys/values. But very
few are still so badly designed that they will not run or configure under a
regular user account after they are installed.

If you are saying you are having trouble because those in your office need
to install things frequently - that is a whole different story. That is
handled by policies - political policies. This means the management of the
company in question has to allow the IT department some ability to restrict
what may be on the machine for stability and security reasons - otherwise
there is no real point in the department other than fixing the problems
caused by habving all these users setup as admins so they can install/do
whatever they like.

The google products do not need to have admin rights to run.
Palm devices may require admin rights to install - but not to run.

And I wouldn't want my users installing random devices on the system
anyway - and especially not random software. After all - these are work
machines - if they are always crashing because the user decided Bit Torrent
sounded cool and tried it - then productivity has decreased by at least that
worker. Not to mention the implication of having all admins with
viruses/trojans floatingg around as well as just the amount of spyware that
is better controller with user rights.

You need to discuss this with management of whatever company you work for -
tell them that in order to have better productivity with the equipment you
have - there will have to be some boundaries. You can step over those
boundaries as you see fit - but I would not make it habit.

--
Shenan Stanley
MS-MVP
--
How To Ask Questions The Smart Way
http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html


.



Relevant Pages

  • RE: Office tries to repair/reinstall
    ... Giving admin rights to everyone is not the solution. ... The file association issue should be also related to the Office 2007 installation. ... I will check the registry and install windows installer. ...
    (microsoft.public.office.setup)
  • Re: Granting all users Admin Rights
    ... I am a Network Admin for Cuesta College and we are dealing with the same ... Techs to go to install every little piece of software on users computers. ... I believe that giving users Power Users rights is the best way ...
    (microsoft.public.win2000.security)
  • Re: Rights and Policies
    ... ones that already exist from before the client PC was joined to the domain, ... Administrator account, and install the application. ... Then have the user with regular non-admin rights ...
    (microsoft.public.windows.server.sbs)
  • Re: Rights and Policies
    ... you would log onto the client PC with either the Local or Domain ... Administrator account, and install the application. ... Then have the user with regular non-admin rights log ...
    (microsoft.public.windows.server.sbs)
  • Re: New IE flaw and exploit sites/migration to non-MS browser
    ... If an application is written for TODAY's Windows XP logo it will run as a non administrator. ... That is the quick and dirty test to see if you have admin rights... ... You have administrator rights to your machine. ... And make sure your folks that are making the purchasing decisions know that this needs to be a requirement...because in this day and age of computer technology there is NO EXCUSE for a vendor to code like we are running Windows 98 around this place. ...
    (Focus-Microsoft)

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