Almost all system administrators make certain changes and make the system restricted. System Administrators can hide the RUN option, the FIND command, the entire Control Panel, drives in My Computer like D: A: etc. They can even restrict activities of a hacker my disabling or hiding, even the tiniest options or tools.
Most commonly these restrictions are imposed locally and are controlled by the Windows Registry. But sometimes the smart system administrators control the activities of the hacker by imposing restrictions remotely through the main server.
Poledit or Policy Editor is a small kewl tool which is being commonly used by system administrators to alter the settings of a system. This utility is not installed by default by Windows. You need to install in manually from the Windows 98 Installation Kit from the Resource Kit folder. user.dat file that we saw earlier.
The Policy Editor tool imposes restrictions on the user's system by editing the user.dat file which in turn means that it edits the Windows Registry to change the settings. It can be used to control or restrict access to each and every folder and option you could ever think of. It has the power to even restrict access to individual folders, files, the Control Panel, MS DOS, the drives available etc.
Sometimes this software does make life really hard for a Hacker. So how can we remove the restrictions imposed by the Policy Editor? Well read ahead to learn more.
You see the Policy Editor is not the only way to restrict a user's activities. As we already know that the Policy Editor edits the Windows Registry(user.dat) file to impose such restrictions. So this in turn would mean that we can directly make changes to the Windows Registry using a .reg file or directly to remove or add restrictions.
Launch Regedit and go to the following Registry Key:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/CurrentVersion/Policies
Under this key, there will definitely be a key named explorer. Now under this explorer key we can create new DWORD values and modify it's value to 1 in order to impose the restriction. If you want to remove the Restriction, then you can simply delete the respective DWORD values or instead change their values to 0. The following is a list of DWORD values that can be created under the Explorer Key-:
NoDeletePrinter: Disables Deletion of already installed Printers
NoAddPrinter: Disables Addition of new Printers
NoRun : Disables or hides the Run Command
NoSetFolders: Removes Folders from the Settings option on Start Menu (Control Panel, Printers, Taskbar)
NoSetTaskbar: Removes Taskbar system folder from the Settings option on Start Menu
NoFind: Removes the Find Tool (Start >Find)
NoDrives: Hides and does not display any Drives in My Computer
NoNetHood: Hides or removes the Network Neighborhood icon from the desktop
NoDesktop: Hides all items including, file, folders and system folders from the Desktop
NoClose: Disables Shutdown and prevents the user from normally shutting down Windows.
NoSaveSettings: Means to say, 'Don't save settings on exit'
DisableRegistryTools: Disable Registry Editing Tools (If you disable this option, the Windows Registry Editor(regedit.exe) too
will not work.)
NoRecentDocsHistory: Removes Recent Document system folder from the Start Menu (IE 4 and above)
ClearRecentDocsOnExit: Clears the Recent Documents system folder on Exit.
Nolnternetlcon: Removes the Internet (system folder) icon from the Desktop
Under the same key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/CurrentVersion/Policies you can create new subkeys other than the already existing Explorer key. Now create a new key and name it System. Under this new key, system we can create the following new DWORD values(1 for enabling the particular option and 0 for disabling the particular option):
NODispCPL: Hides Control Panel
NoDispBackgroundPage: Hides Background page.
NoDispScrsavPage: Hides Screen Saver Page
NoDispAppearancePage: Hides Appearance Page
NoDispSettingsPage: Hides Settings Page
NoSecCPL: Disables Password Control Panel
NoPwdPage: Hides Password Change Page
NoAdminPaqe: Hides Remote Administration Page
NoProfilePage: Hides User Profiles Page
NoDevMgrPage: Hides Device Manager Page
NoConfigPage: Hides Hardware Profiles Page
NoFileSysPage: Hides File System Button
NoVirtMemPage: Hides Virtual Memory Button
Similarly, if we create a new subkey named Network, we can add the following DWORD values under it(1 for enabling the particular option and 0 for disabling the particular option):
NoNetSetupSecurityPage: Hides Network Security Page
NoNelSetup: Hides or disables the Network option in the Control Panel
NoNetSetupIDPage: Hides the Identification Page
NoNetSetupSecurityPage: Hides the Access Control Page
NoFileSharingControl: Disables File Sharing Controls
NoPrintSharing: Disables Print Sharing Controls
Similarly, if we create a new subkey named WinOldApp, we can add the following DWORD values under it(1 for enabling the particular option and 0 for disabling the particular option):
Most commonly these restrictions are imposed locally and are controlled by the Windows Registry. But sometimes the smart system administrators control the activities of the hacker by imposing restrictions remotely through the main server.
Poledit or Policy Editor is a small kewl tool which is being commonly used by system administrators to alter the settings of a system. This utility is not installed by default by Windows. You need to install in manually from the Windows 98 Installation Kit from the Resource Kit folder. user.dat file that we saw earlier.
The Policy Editor tool imposes restrictions on the user's system by editing the user.dat file which in turn means that it edits the Windows Registry to change the settings. It can be used to control or restrict access to each and every folder and option you could ever think of. It has the power to even restrict access to individual folders, files, the Control Panel, MS DOS, the drives available etc.
Sometimes this software does make life really hard for a Hacker. So how can we remove the restrictions imposed by the Policy Editor? Well read ahead to learn more.
You see the Policy Editor is not the only way to restrict a user's activities. As we already know that the Policy Editor edits the Windows Registry(user.dat) file to impose such restrictions. So this in turn would mean that we can directly make changes to the Windows Registry using a .reg file or directly to remove or add restrictions.
Launch Regedit and go to the following Registry Key:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/CurrentVersion/Policies
Under this key, there will definitely be a key named explorer. Now under this explorer key we can create new DWORD values and modify it's value to 1 in order to impose the restriction. If you want to remove the Restriction, then you can simply delete the respective DWORD values or instead change their values to 0. The following is a list of DWORD values that can be created under the Explorer Key-:
NoDeletePrinter: Disables Deletion of already installed Printers
NoAddPrinter: Disables Addition of new Printers
NoRun : Disables or hides the Run Command
NoSetFolders: Removes Folders from the Settings option on Start Menu (Control Panel, Printers, Taskbar)
NoSetTaskbar: Removes Taskbar system folder from the Settings option on Start Menu
NoFind: Removes the Find Tool (Start >Find)
NoDrives: Hides and does not display any Drives in My Computer
NoNetHood: Hides or removes the Network Neighborhood icon from the desktop
NoDesktop: Hides all items including, file, folders and system folders from the Desktop
NoClose: Disables Shutdown and prevents the user from normally shutting down Windows.
NoSaveSettings: Means to say, 'Don't save settings on exit'
DisableRegistryTools: Disable Registry Editing Tools (If you disable this option, the Windows Registry Editor(regedit.exe) too
will not work.)
NoRecentDocsHistory: Removes Recent Document system folder from the Start Menu (IE 4 and above)
ClearRecentDocsOnExit: Clears the Recent Documents system folder on Exit.
Nolnternetlcon: Removes the Internet (system folder) icon from the Desktop
Under the same key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/CurrentVersion/Policies you can create new subkeys other than the already existing Explorer key. Now create a new key and name it System. Under this new key, system we can create the following new DWORD values(1 for enabling the particular option and 0 for disabling the particular option):
NODispCPL: Hides Control Panel
NoDispBackgroundPage: Hides Background page.
NoDispScrsavPage: Hides Screen Saver Page
NoDispAppearancePage: Hides Appearance Page
NoDispSettingsPage: Hides Settings Page
NoSecCPL: Disables Password Control Panel
NoPwdPage: Hides Password Change Page
NoAdminPaqe: Hides Remote Administration Page
NoProfilePage: Hides User Profiles Page
NoDevMgrPage: Hides Device Manager Page
NoConfigPage: Hides Hardware Profiles Page
NoFileSysPage: Hides File System Button
NoVirtMemPage: Hides Virtual Memory Button
Similarly, if we create a new subkey named Network, we can add the following DWORD values under it(1 for enabling the particular option and 0 for disabling the particular option):
NoNetSetupSecurityPage: Hides Network Security Page
NoNelSetup: Hides or disables the Network option in the Control Panel
NoNetSetupIDPage: Hides the Identification Page
NoNetSetupSecurityPage: Hides the Access Control Page
NoFileSharingControl: Disables File Sharing Controls
NoPrintSharing: Disables Print Sharing Controls
Similarly, if we create a new subkey named WinOldApp, we can add the following DWORD values under it(1 for enabling the particular option and 0 for disabling the particular option):
