Physical computer security.

[bilbous]

Do you live in a dorm or student house where others can easily access your computer? Do you password protect access to it, what about BIOS passwords so that people cannot boot from a CD or USB drive? It seems to me that given a lot of the forum members are in college some of them may be suffering from pranking neighbors or others may be collaborating their posts much the way Ann Landers had students trying to get a public response.

This is just a reminder that if you do not have strict control over the physical access of your computer you need to make it difficult for others to abuse your facilities. Lots of talk is made about firewalls and anti-malware software but not so much about user permissions and physical access controls.

[Parallo]

I live in Donegal. It would be a serious task to physicaly get near my computer unless you're a farmer.

[Socius Rockus]

  Never heard of those key thingies? at my school all the computers have keyholes, and have to be put on with... (yes you guessed) a push on the 'on' button and a key.
I know (from experience) that it's not safe is, with a screwdriver and some fast work it's out in less then 5 minutes but I at least buys you another five minutes to discovers them people who are trying to be funny with your PC

[emeraldfool]

What do you suggest, hiring a big burly black dude to stand next to your PC looking mean?

[lordraleigh]

What do you suggest, hiring a big burly black dude to stand next to your PC looking mean?

Your racist stereotypes are deserving of punishment now! 

Most famous Irish in the world  (And definitively the typical northsider from Dublin) 

[bilbous]

Oh there is no doubt that someone with enough determination can get into your machine, the idea is to make in so inconvenient that they will move on to the next guys.With a bios password they cannot even boot the machine unless they guess the pass or manage to get in and short the bios, and to keep them out of the box you can use those security screws whatever they are called.

[lordraleigh]

There is a great way:

1) A retinal scanner check is required to power the PC.

2) A fingerprint scanner check is required for the BIOS to load.

[bilbous]

I say implant it in your skull have a jack in the back.  I've always wanted to be a trickle-head...

[Parallo]

Most famous Irish in the world 

Hey! He's not the only Irish guy here. I feel obliged to even it up rather than insult back. Linky.

[emeraldfool]

Most famous Irish in the world 

Hey! He's not the only Irish guy here. I feel obliged to even it up rather than insult back. Linky.

Uh-huh, allow me to insult back.


Also, there's at least 6 celebrities that have big burly black dudes with sunglasses as bodyguards. It's the new fad...

Some time in the future, when me and my celebrity friends are relaxing in our mansions, we can race them to see which one has the fastest, and then we'll swap them like trading cards. 'Cause I can.

(I'm not a racist )

[Radiant Memphis]

I guess you could try Lock My PC™ a shareware I found or Lock My PC 4. I used Lock My PC 4 at work and it works pretty well. I would also suggest setting up key commands to lock the keyboard out. So, no mater what: reboot, trying bios etc. will only bring you to a blank screen whereby only a series of keystrokes will bring you to the main password screen. For instance on a small level my friend, just to keep his wife (technologically challenged) off his main server PC has set the scroll lock as a locking mechanism to lock the keyboard out and put the monitor to sleep. Of course this can be made more complex with more keystorkes needed to open the things back up. Also, the old way that some may not remember or suspect is Window symbol + L like shown here in Different Ways to Lock Windows XP. If all else fails, I say go to Linux.