Task Manager Password???

Thanks. I didn't see EDS there (which is supposed to mount TC containers.) Going to give it a try.

No there is no Truecrypt app for Android, but there are other apps that can unmount/mount Truecrypt containers.

Ouch. I would avoid any password protection utilities other than the tried and true, such as WinRAR, TrueCrypt, WinZIP, GPG4Win, or Symantec's PGP Encryption Desktop. I've seen conduit bundled with all kinds of stuff, and it is tough to get rid of, as it inserts browser add-ons into every Web browser it hits.

Other unwanted add-ons will chew up your machine's CPU time mining bitcoins for the blokes in China.

I definitely would recommend TrueCrypt. For Android, I would look at luks manager and freeOTFE, as there is no TrueCrypt program available for Android, AFAIK. Another utility would be looking at EncFS type of apps which don't create one large encrypted file as a volume, but store stuff encrypted in a folder. Once the folder is mounted, stuff is read/written on the fly.

I certainly didn't think that I had protected anything with WinGuard Pro, and I'm normally carefully about documenting passwords, backups, disk images etc. but perhaps it was a cockpit problem. :?

So you had WinGuard Pro installed? Makes sense that it was preventing access to Task Manager without a password.

Truecrypt would still be my first choice. It's easy to setup and configure as many encrypted containers as you want. I encrypt my email client and browsers, as well as, My Documents, My Photos, and Dropbox with a single Truecrypt container on all my desktops/notebooks. Looking to start using Truecrypt containers in Android, but haven't got around to it yet.

OK, Thanks for the great input! msconfig showed Conduit and I thought I had eliminated that horrible Adware program. Actually I had and only a few passive remnants were remaining. The culprit was Winguard Pro which I had installed and not actually used. I thought that it might be a reasonable alternative to True Crypt but apparently I was my own worst enemy. But I’m open to other alternatives.

As of now Winguard Pro has been removed and WinGrard Pro, Conduit and Lightscribe are all disabled in the startup programs.
Again thanks so much for your help!

UAC is now at the highest level, the login password is enabled and I need/want to apply encryption to one sensitive folder. The purchased version of Malwarebytes remains active and on guard as well as MS Security Essentials.

1492 wrote:

HappyKayakers wrote:

CA Traveler wrote:

No password required in Safe Mode so does this suggest that some driver, etc is responsible and is there any way to narrow down the problem?

This suggests that some program running at startup is hijacking some of your processes. Go back to safe mode and run msconfig....

While you're in Safe Mode, run the free version of Malwarebytes. This does looks suspicious, as you didn't change permissions? Blocking access to Task Manager would be something malware might do to prevent you from killing its process. Though admittedly, a faulty system update could also conceivably cause this issue.

Ditto

HappyKayakers wrote:

CA Traveler wrote:

No password required in Safe Mode so does this suggest that some driver, etc is responsible and is there any way to narrow down the problem?

This suggests that some program running at startup is hijacking some of your processes. Go back to safe mode and run msconfig....

While you're in Safe Mode, run the free version of Malwarebytes. This does looks suspicious, as you didn't change permissions? Blocking access to Task Manager would be something malware might do to prevent you from killing its process. Though admittedly, a faulty system update could also conceivably cause this issue.

CA Traveler wrote:

No password required in Safe Mode so does this suggest that some driver, etc is responsible and is there any way to narrow down the problem?

This suggests that some program running at startup is hijacking some of your processes. Go back to safe mode and run msconfig. Disable all the startup programs. Boot back into normal mode and test your task manager or regedit. If they work without prompting for a password, start enabling your startup programs one at a time, testing after each one until you find the culprit.

Please post back here when you find the offending program.

Thanks for the comments, options tried:

Changed UAC to Never, no change.

regedit.exe also requires a password and Cancel on that window doesn’t work so I had to reboot (Cancel OK on Task Manager).

No password required in Safe Mode so does this suggest that some driver, etc is responsible and is there any way to narrow down the problem?

Created a new Admin account which has the same problem.

Ctrl Alt Delete is the normal way I get to window and then the Start Task Manager button. Cntr Shift Esc also takes me to the password screen.

I haven’t tried a earlier restore point but will if there is no other solution. On 12/2 there was a Critical Windows Update, however I’m not sure when the password problem started.

I agree that lack of a logon password is not the best practice but that at least seemed to eliminate the user password as part of the problem.