Enter Windows XP without a password

Not long ago, there was a piece of news on the internet, saying that foreign windows experts found that using the Windows 2000 installation CD to start the computer can not enter the Windows XP Administrator password that enters the Windows XP fault Recovery Console mode.

Is this true? I did some tests.

The wndows XP version used by the author is Windows XP proessional, and Windows 2000 is the Simplified Chinese version of Windows proessional integrated with SP3. I first installed Windows XP proessional on drive C (fat322 file system), and set the administraor account password during installation. To confirm that the administrator password has been set successfully, I switched to the classic Windows logon mode and then logged on using the adndnistrato account. You can see that the password is required for logon, And the password setting for the Administrator account is correct.

I restarted my computer and used Windows 2000 poessional to install the CD boot. On the wndows2000 installation selection page, select Windows 2000 (press the r key );, then, use the fault console to repair the problem (press the C key). The system will scan the existing window2000/XP version. Since the author only has one operating system, only one logon option (L: C: \ Windows) is listed ). Press L on the keyboard, and then press Enter. At this time, as it is passed abroad, Window XP does not require the administrator password, instead, you can log on to the fault recovery console directly. (If you are using a Windows XP installation disc, you must enter the administrator password. Here the Administrator refers to the built-in administraor account in the system )(). Anyone familiar with Windows knows that the fault recovery console can perform any system-level operations, such as copying, moving, and deleting files, starting or stopping services, and even formatting and partitioning.

Next, I installed the SPI patch for Windows XP, and used Windows 2000 to install the CD boot again. I repeated the above operations and found that the results were the same, no Password is required because the FAT32 file system is used previously. I guess this is caused by fat3z's file system. Then, use the convert command in wndows XP to convert the fat3z File System to the NTFS file system, and then use Windows 2000 to install the CD boot again. Repeat the above operations and find that the results are the same, there is still no password to lose. It seems that this vulnerability exists.

Note that, due to various reasons, some windows 2000 installation discs on the market cannot display the logon options of the faulty console. Therefore, this vulnerability cannot be exploited. At the same time, due to the limitation of the faulty Console mode, the vulnerability cannot be exploited from the network. In other words, the vulnerability is limited to a single machine, so the hazard is not very great.

I started the application with an English official version of wndows 2000 Server integrated with SP3, and found that the vulnerability still exists. It seems that this problem exists not only in the Chinese version, but also in the English version.