Installs and Such

[Clayton]

Hello All
I have a question concerning installs and Internet
Explorer.
Here I have a big problem with clients downloading things
like WebShots and ScreenSaver programs.
How can I stop all of this?
I have searched through Group Policy until I am blue in
the face.
I have locked down clients to the point they can not change
their desktops and most everything else but I can not get
them to stop downloading programs nor keep them from
installing them...
Is there a Group Policy (I might have missed) that I can
stop downloads, stop installs, stop everything period!!!?
Thanks

 

[Cary Shultz [A.D. MVP]]

Clayton,

There are a couple of things that you can do. I assume that the clients are
WIN2000 or WINXP Pro?

1) Make sure that the domain user account object is not a member of the
local computer's Administrator group. I might suggest that you make the
domain user account object a member of the local computer's Power Users
group instead. This will help your situation and is a very good practice.
You can use Group Policy ( Restricted Groups ) to help you with this.

2) Use Group Policy to not allow them to install certain applications. You
would enter the names of the .exe files that should not be allowed to be
installed. Naturally, the problem with this is that they can download it,
change the name of the .exe file and then install it. My first suggestion
might just help avoid this being successful!

3) Get Management onboard and come up with a policy that forbids this and
have some sort of consequences in place when people do this anyway! My wife
works for the County of Roanoke and they have a similar policy in place.
People just do not do it because the Tech Support lady there runs around and
checks and when she catches you the first time you get written up and if she
catches you a second time there are severe consequences.

HTH,

Cary