Mobile Computing

Because portable computers are vulnerable to theft, it is important that you secure a portable computer and the data on it with as many Windows 2000 security features as possible. In general, hard drives format to use NTFS so that permissions can be set and encryption (EFS) enabled on files and folders. Add the users of portable computers to the Power Users group so that they have maximum control of the computer without having full control of the system. Users should use strong passwords for logging on to their network and administrators should use strong passwords for the local administrator account. Use Group Policy settings as much as possible to restrict access to the computer and any data on it. For more information about these security features, see Security, , Managing Files, Folders, and Search Methods and File Systems in this book. In this section, the discussion focuses on security considerations that are relevant to portable computers, including undocking privileges, BIOS security, and security for offline files.