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I am trying to figure out if having a user in the "Users" group will be enough to prevent her from install unwanted software.

The things that I don't want the user to be able to install are:

  • virus
  • malware
  • bandoo stuff
  • Internet Explorer Addons

To put you in context, I am thinking of my grandma's computer, I want her to be able to read all her email stuff and attachments, but without the hassle of needing to reinstall the whole computer every few months.

The computer will run Windows XP, with some free antivirus. It will not be part of any domain. It is just a home computer.

Linux, I have tried making her use it, but she was already accustomed to Windows and was not really an option to have her re-learn where was the shutdown button.

So, are these considerations enough to prevent her installing unwanted software? What other options come to you mind?

Thanks

2 Answers 2

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Yes unless the user is part of the administrator's group she should not be able to install software.

That doesn't prohibit her from visiting malicious websites and getting infected but you got that covered with AV so it looks like you are good to go.

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    Malware can still be installed inside the user's profile directory, similar to Google Chrome, for example.
    – oKtosiTe
    Feb 15, 2011 at 14:47
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    You don't need Administrator access to be a botnet zombie.
    – afrazier
    Feb 15, 2011 at 14:51
  • Is malware installed in the user's profile directory of a low privileged user easier to remove? Will things like those impossible to stop processes get installed in this way?
    – DanC
    Feb 15, 2011 at 18:15
  • Yes, because you can generally log into a different user account and blow it away. You just have to be super-extra careful that you don't run something by accident and infect the Administrator account.
    – afrazier
    Feb 15, 2011 at 18:38
  • -1 He asked "Can a user that belongs only to the “Users” group in Windows XP install malware, virus or IE addons?" You reply "Yes unless the user is part of the administrator's group she should not be able to install software" If that is what you mean then your first word should be "No" not "Yes". Otherwise your sentence doesn't make sense.He said "can they" and you say "yes they can't" U meant to say "no they can't" or "no they can't unless.."What you said to "can they" was "yes they can't unless". He asked a question in his title and your first word (Yes/No) was not even what u meant
    – barlop
    Jun 1, 2014 at 16:30
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If I may be so blunt, the regular user/administrator distinction is there to protect the system, not your grand mother's data.

My father, in this respect, is your grand mother, and I set up his laptop with him having reduced privileges. This doesn't prevent him from calling me with his credit card in hand, ready to pass on sensitive information to malware authors. It also doesn't protect his personal files which are much much more important than the health of the OS.

While giving your grandmother's login reduced privileges is a good idea, it's just part of the solution. The other part is making her understand that the computer should never tell her to do anything that involves puling out a credit card (and that she should call you instead if this happens), and also give her an external hard drive and set up back ups (incremental, so that when she clicks the "your computer has 100,000 viruses" banner and kills her files, she won't overwrite a good backup).

The real threats here are not malware that mess with the system, it's malware that messes with the users' heads, and unfortunately our ancestors are so vulnerable to these attacks.

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  • Thanks for your post, but the computer is just a used for web browsing and email, so there is not any data that needs to be backed up. Also, she has been explicitly forbidden to put any kind of data including credit card numbers, or whatever thing she asked for. So, yes, I am trying to protect the system, and not my Grandma or her data, since I will be the one re installing the system again and again as long as ##$@&*ware keeps poping up windows to the point that it becames unusable.
    – DanC
    Feb 15, 2011 at 18:13
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    Then keep a image of the configured system handy and worry as little as possible about it. If Grandma breaks her system, just reimage it and run Windows Update. Have tea with Grandma while you wait. :-)
    – afrazier
    Feb 15, 2011 at 18:41

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