Should I use a standard account for every day and have a separate Admin account?

cereberus said:

Yep - 100% agree. Average 13 year olds only know basics taught at school.

It is only adults who have never bothered to learn anything about computers who spout this myth.

These same people used to put around myth that children know how to programme a video recorder better than adults.

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hader said:

The possibility is there for security reasons.
But the possibility is there for 1 and one reason only; Single user or Multiple users.

In a single user condition and multiple accounts; What's the reason for having multiple accounts? Don't you trust yourself? Afraid of doing things that might damage or wreak havoc on your PC? ("I don't know what I am doing scenario")

Standard Windows has some mechanisms onboard in case of multiple user environments in place to make separations; 1 user can not get to the data of an other user. (can be changed by giving the other user permissions to access his data) The Administrator (It's account is disabled together with the Default user and guest) belongs to the administrator group and have elevated rights. The user who install Windows belongs standard to the Administrator group.(One rank below the higher ones; system and trustedinstaller. a little like the root user on Linux but with the exception; It's password remains a secret.) All the other users are a part of the user group. Policy's dictate what each person Admin, User1, User2 can or can't do. I case of multiple users the Administrator role is a heavier one. Can install software and determines which user may us it. If a Admin installs software it can determine you can use this software and even restrict it to a single person. The Admin can start anything. If a user installs software; he is the only one who can start it but not an other user. The admin can alter policy's (a complete unaware phenomena for normal users) to restrict or to grant certain actions. A lot is in basis already there but you must have a bit more knowledge than an average user to secure things.

I think your question is more related to your concern of your data and who might can get acces to your data if your laptop is stolen. A single account is enough here if you are the only user of the laptop. No need to have 2 account which you can use. There are other ways. Make sure that bitlocker is turned on for all your disks. It will encrypt your data with a key AND!! it its wise to export this key and safeguard it on a separate secure place. If you forget this key and it's asking for it... then your data is toast!!! Furthermore it is important to have a good antivirus software who can guard you from outside attacks including zero day and rootkits attacks if up to date. (installing a keylogger and retrieve it to on a later point of time and breaking in without being aware of things) You have access to your laptop by means of a biometrics device. (fingerprint) The most secure way to safeguard your laptop. No more 12345678. If someone steals your laptop; nobody will return and hack your thumb off to get access to your laptop. Some laptops (like HP and other brands) also have a DriveLock mechanism. You can turn this on: but be aware; if forgotten? Nobody can access the disk anymore. The lock is on the disk itself. You can take it out of your laptop and connect it to an other system. Without that password nobody can access the drive anymore. And to prevent many tries one after the other; After 3 time the wrong password; it's stops listening or trying. You have to turn the power off and back on again to give it an other try.

Turn your attention also to external devices. The first thing is to change your password inside your modem. This modem has also many policy's in place to safeguard your network from an outside attacks. Not changing it is like leaving your house with the front door wide open. If your are using WiFi make sure it's using WPA2 and using a very difficult password. You have to enter it once in case of a new device. Mobile phone, printer etc.
Further more there is a ton of software available to beef up your security. It's important to do the things mentioned earlier. And UAC? Leave it on. Even if you have it turned on.. Yes those question each time a piece of software is starting that needs a bit more rights to do it's work. Live with it. It's an annoying message but a beter one than turning it off. Then your system is more vulnerable then you expected. It's like inviting a burglar into your house.

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nuspieds said:

As the only user of my laptop, I have only one login and, of course, it has Administrator rights.

I want and need to be able to do whatever I want without the need to elevate or logout and login to an Admin account.

But if my laptop were shared, for sure I would create those additional accounts with only the rights they need.

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spapakons said:

To make your password more secure, enable Japanese or Chinese text and add a character that only you know how to type. Let's see if it can be hacked...

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nuspieds said:

But, hey, your hacker might be Japanese or Chinese or neither but still fluent in either so, sorry, you'll still be vulnerable!

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Scannerman said:

The thing about laptops is that they can be stolen a lot easier. I only have one personal laptop and admittedly, it does not have the fingerprint device. I once owned a laptop like that but gave it to a dear friend who was light years beyond me in knowledge of software and hardware as a gift. He needed something to do while he was in the hospital. So I sheepishly confess that I'm all administrative on my laptop which only has Windows 11 on it and no doubt it needs updating again as I rarely use the blasted thing.

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nuspieds said:

If I ruled the world, I'd make BitLocker mandatory for everyone!

So, yeah, especially when you travel a lot and use it while waiting at the airport or even just leaving it in your hotel room while you go out to dinner, the risk of theft is higher. How many of us, in an airline lounge, for example, pack up the laptop into the backpack and take it with you because you need to use the restroom for a few short minutes?

An airline lounge is one thing, but to see people be so cavalier in public spaces like a bar/restaurant at an airport, for example, boggles the mind! When in those types of environments, yes, I pack up and take my backpack with me, even if it is for a quick few minutes in the restroom. But like anywhere else, an airline lounge is just another cross-section of society: Not everyone in the lounge is an angel! I was once seated near the lounge reception and a guy ran past me to the reception desk, asking if they had seen someone leave with a laptop because his was now gone!

So, back to BitLocker, I not only have it enabled for my drives (including USB) and partitions, but I also enabled the boot PIN. The only USB drives for which I do not enable BitLocker are the flash drives that I specifically use to transfer files to/from someone else's PC, which brings me back to my original point: If I ruled the world...

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Scannerman said:

I once felt the same way about bit locker back in my Win 7 days. Later, a friend of mine got nailed with Ransomware. I asked if he was using bit locker and he said he was. Then I began seeing posts about people who had bit locker enabled who were also nailed with Ransomware. I decided to remove bit locker from all my PCs. I did receive some ominous messages after ward about how my PC was going to be locked out if I didn't pay up but every time I rebooted all was well. I use Kaspersky now so I'm not that worried about Ransomware and I don't use bit locker at all.

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SlicEnDicE said:

Speaking of BitLocker...it's not as secure as you may think...the older version was hacked within 43s using a RPi Pico and the newer patched version is still vulnerable...just something to think about...

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nuspieds said:

Are you confusing BitLocker (storage encryption) with BitDefender (Antivirus)? Because BitLocker is not about preventing malware.

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nuspieds said:

If I ruled the world, I'd make BitLocker mandatory for everyone!

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