Securing The Login Process
Last week we looked at securing your user account–which includes your documents, pictures, passwords, and more–when you step away from your computer. This week we are going to look at simple settings to secure the login process.
Two steps to secure the login process are to Disable Automatic Login if you didn’t with last weeks’ tip, and force users to enter the username as well as the password. Here’s how.
- Open System Preferences in the Apple Menu
- Click the Accounts preference pane.
- Click Login Options at the bottom of the left column.
- Click the Lock in the lower left and enter an admin username and password (probably yours).
- Change the Automatic login popup to disabled.
- Directly under that setting, change the Display login window as to Name and password
Now when your computer is restarted or a user logs out of her account, in order to login the user will be required to type the user account name as well as the password, requiring any would-be hackers to guess both. You can use either your “Long Name” which his visible in that left column of the Accounts preference pane or your “Short Name” which is the name of your home folder.