Paul Thurrott - Windows 8 Secrets

• Enable the Guest account:While you can go to great lengths to protect standard user accounts with parental controls, sometimes all you’re looking for is a single, temporary user account with standard user privileges that anyone can use. As with previous Windows versions, Windows 8 includes such an account, called the Guest account, and it’s a safe and easy way to let others use your PC without worrying that they’re going to view, modify, or delete any crucial data, uninstall or change an application, or perform other dangerous tasks.

To enable the Guest account, select Manage another account from the main User Accounts control panel. Then, in the Manage Accounts screen, choose Guest. (Its icon will note that the Guest account is off.)

The control panel will ask you whether you’re sure you wish to enable this account, noting that password-protected files, folders, and settings are not accessible to guest users. Click Turn on to enable the Guest account.

Now, when you leave the computer, you can lock your account (easiest way: Winkey + L). And then your children or actual guests can browse the web, run apps, and perform other common duties using the Guest account while you’re away: A new Guest option will appear on the lock screen.

Remember that the Guest account is temporary to each sign-in. So when the user signs out of the Guest account, any settings changes or documents they’ve created will be deleted. Each time you sign in to the Guest account is like the first time that account is used, and nothing is retained.

• Reset EAS Policies:When you sign in to a Windows 8 PC or device with a Microsoft account, you’re using a technology called Exchange ActiveSync (EAS) under the covers to provide push-based access to your Hotmail-based e-mail, calendar, contacts, and other data. EAS is a Microsoft-created corporate standard that is used by Hotmail and Microsoft’s Exchange- and Office 365-based services, and also by competing services from Apple, Google, and other companies. (In this way, it’s a de facto standard for all modern mobile devices.) And one of its big advantages is that it supports the notion of EAS policies, which can set restrictions on the device—smartphone, tablet, or PC—that you use to access the underlying services. For example, your workplace may want to ensure that you sign in with an account that has an acceptable password (from a length and complexity standpoint) and then auto-locks after a certain period of inactivity.

When you sign in with a Microsoft account, whatever restrictions Hotmail enforces are automatically applied to your PC. But this is only required if you are using Microsoft’s bundled Mail app. If you access Hotmail’s e-mail, calendar, and contacts from a Windows application, or from the web, you can decouple Hotmail’s EAS policy requirements from your PC. And, oddly enough, you do this from the User Accounts control panel: Just click Reset EAS Policies on the left, and you’ll see a window like the one shown in Figure 12-13.

Figure 12-13:You can reset EAS policies on your PC.

The User Accounts control panel experience described in this chapter applies only to those who sign in with a local or Microsoft account. If you sign in with a domain account—or on a PC for which a domain account has been configured—you’re going to see some different options in the User Accounts control panel.

While many of these options are only of interest to domain administrators, it’s worth pointing out one of the common tasks we mentioned earlier is managed using this interface: changing an account type. To change an account type, click Manage User Accounts. Instead of opening a new view in the User Accounts control panel window, you will see the old-school windows in Figure 12-14.

Figure 12-14:User Accounts management on a domain-based system.

Now, select the account you want to change—and if you see two entries for one account, as you will for Microsoft accounts, choose the top one—and click Properties. Then just choose Standard user or Administrator from that window.

The easing of restrictions will apply until and unless you run the Mail, Calendar, People, or Messaging app(s) again. At that time, the EAS policies required by Hotmail will be simply be silently reapplied. If you sign in with a corporate account, however, it won’t be so silent: You’ll be prompted to accept the policies change.

While Mac partisans and tech pundits like to present a tortured view of how difficult it is to secure a Windows PC, the truth is far less dramatic. Previous to Windows 8, there were a few simple steps you could take to technically secure your PC—enabling automatic updates and installing an antivirus solution—and that, combined with some good old-fashioned common sense was all that was required.

In Windows 8, you’ll be ecstatic to know, it’s even easier.

Under the hood, of course, Microsoft’s decades-long commitment to system security continues. This version of Windows includes the same anti-malware technology, firewall, User Account Control, and other security features that made Windows 7 the most secure version of Windows yet. And then they turned it up a notch by adding two crucial new features: Antivirus is now included in the OS, finally, so you won’t need to add that separately. And the SmartScreen protection feature that the company debuted in Internet Explorer 9 is now part of Windows, so you’re protected even if you use competing browsers.

You’ll still want to employ common sense. But that’s not a focus of this book.

Microsoft has included an integrated anti-spyware and anti-malware solution called Windows Defender since Windows Vista. Defender was good at what it did—in fact, most Windows users simply aren’t even aware of its existence, which is proof of its efficiency—but it’s always been lacking one crucial feature: It didn’t include antivirus functionality. So we recommended an external and free utility called Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE) for this purpose: MSE looked and worked just like Defender, but it added that one crucial feature, completing the Windows security picture.

Now, Windows Defender includes the same antivirus functionality that used to be part of Microsoft Security Essentials. It’s built into Windows 8, it’s enabled by default, and you get it for free, just for buying into Windows 8.

This is exciting because both of us have used MSE for years, and we trust it to protect not only our own PCs, but more crucially those of our families and friends. And we’ve experienced no major issues yet. Not once.

So our advice is simple. Assuming you’re not spending your time in the nether regions of the web, downloading illegal software and goodness knows what else, Windows Defender is enough. It’s lightweight and quiet, and it won’t bother you with annoying pop-up dialogs. You won’t need other security applications or even more expensive security suites. You know, assuming that common sense is employed.

Okay, there is one more thing you can continue doing from time to time: Use a second anti-malware utility. (You should never use two antivirus solutions, however, because they will interfere with each other.) It’s not necessary to leave the second anti-malware utility running in real time, but it’s a good idea to run it once in a while, just to make sure something hasn’t slipped by.