How to manage security settings of outlook PST file?

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Almost every outlook user is aware that email items such as emails, contacts, calendars, notes get stored in a PST file format in Outlook. These PST files also stores important and confidential information of user so it is very necessary to maintain the proper security of PST file. When an outlook user creates a new PST file then MS outlook offers him to choose from three types of encryption:

No Encryption–When you enable this thenthere is no encryption on Outlook PST file (as the name suggest). Anyone can access your PST file by using a text editor so it is always better to avoid this encryption setting.

Compressible Encryption - If you use compressible encryption then your PST file is encoded in format which can be compressed by using compression programs. If a PST file has compressible encryption then it can not be read by any text editor.

Higher Encryption - This type of encryption settings ensure highest degree of protection. High encryption enabled PSTfiles can also be compressed but degree of compression is less as compared with 'Compressible Encryption'. It also increases time to fetch data from a PST file having Higher Encryption setting.

If your PST file does not contain confidential information then you can use 'Compressible Encryption' (or even No Encryption) otherwise you should always select "Higher Encryption".

Beside these securities setting you can also enable password on outlook PST file. Enabling password on PST file ensures that no unauthorized user can access it irrespective of the security settings (compressible or Higher Encryption). The only thing which needs to take care is that you should well memorize your password so that you never forget it. In case you forget PST file password then no need to worry because you can use outlook password recovery software to recover password of PST file.

I hope after reading this article you will be able to protect your private and confidential outlook data from unauthorized access.

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How to Reset Windows 7 Password without any Software?

There are many Windows 7 users who forget their windows login password and face many problems to recover or reset it. These Windows 7 users are always in search of method (manual or automatic) which can help them to recover lost password. So here I am writing about how to reset Windows 7 password without any software.The only resource user need to follow this method is a bootable Windows 7 Installation Disk.

1. Make CD/DVD drive as first booting device (in most of Windows PC CD/DVD drive is first booting device by default) and insert Windows 7 Installation Disk in the drive.

2. On Restarting PC you will see message "Press any key to boot from CD". So you can press any key to start booting (from installation disk) process.

3. Next you will see two options:“Install Windows” and “Repair Windows”. Click “Repair Windows”.

4. Next you will see various options to recover windows. Click on “Command Prompt” option to continue.

5. Type the following commandsin command prompt window:

copy c:\windows\system32\sethc.exe c:\

copy /y c:\windows\system32\cmd.exe c:\windows\system32\sethc.exe

6. Reboot your PC (and take out installation disk)

7. After restart (at login screen) press shift key 5 times. It will show you command prompt window.

8. At command prompt type: net user user_name new_password

For example if you want to set new password 12345 for user Patrick then you can write net user Patrick 12345.

Now you can easily login to windows 7 with new password.

If you don’t have Windows 7 password reset disk (or not able to access command prompt) then no need to worry because there are many password recovery software to reset windows password. These Windows password recovery software provide easiest way to reset windows password in few minutes only.

I hope this article is very helpful for users who want to reset windows 7 password without any software.

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How to Enable Windows 8 Picture Password?

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Recently Microsoft has launched Windows 8 Operating System with many new and unique features as compared with its earlier version Windows 7. Out of these new and unique features, picture password is one of the features which is very attractive and getting popular as lightening speed. This feature allows its user to prevent unauthorized access by enabling password with the help of picture. In picture password authentication system, user can select any picture (to appear on login screen) and register specific patterns by touching (or dragging) finger on the picture.

If you are Windows 8 user and wanted to enable picture password then you can following these steps as given below.

1. Click "Settings" on the Charms bar.

2. In settings panel click "More PC Settings" -> Click "Users" (on the left side of the screen).

3. On clicking "Users" you will see your account information. From "Sign-in options" click "create a picture password" button.

4. You will see "Picture Password Wizard". In the first screen of wizard you will be asked to select a picture to be used for password.

5. After selecting picture you will need to register (two times) 3 gestures on picture by dragging your finger on the picture. You can draw gestures in any shape like line, circle, triangle etc.

Note : Be careful about the direction in which you draw gestures because they are direction sensitive.

6. If you get success in making same gesture (depending upon some accuracy level) then Windows 8 saves it as picture login password for your account and from next time onwards you need to repeat this gesture to login to your user account in Windows 8.

So, now no need to remember long and complex passwords, login quickly by dragging finger on picture. I am sure you will be very excited to share this great feature with your friends too.

READ MORE - How to Enable Windows 8 Picture Password?

How to Protect MS Office 2003 Documents by Applying Password ?

As we know that technology is growing with lightening speed and there are too many good and bad experience user are facing. Maximum data is now easily available and there is high risk of leaking confidential data. Any un-authorized user can access your data very easily if it is not protected. So, it is very important to protect your data which is saved in MS office word, excel, powerpoint etc. 

I am very well aware that many users are not aware about how they can protect MS office document by applying password. Some users found it very difficult exercise to use passwords. 

If you are working on Microsoft Office 2003 then you can apply the following simple and easy steps to protect MS office document (.doc, .xls, .ppt) by applying password protection.

1. Open the document (.doc, .xls, .ppt) to protect with password

2. Click Tools, then Click Options

3. Click Security tab and then click advanced button.

4. Scroll down the encryption type and click RC4, Microsoft Enhanced RSA and AES Cryptographic Provider. By default, the Encrypt document properties box is checked and the Key Length is 128. Confirm both the fields and click OK

5. Two boxes are available in the Options window: Password to Open and Password to Modify. Type the password in the Password to Open box and click OK. Type the password in the Password to modify box also, if you want reviewers to enter a password before they can save changes to the document. But this password needs to be different from the Password to Open box.

6. Re-enter Password to Open and click OK.

7. Click File and then click Save As or click Save, if you have saved the document.

8. Type the file name in Filename and click Save.

By applying above password protection to MS office document you will get the feeling of security because un-authorized user cannot access your document without your permission unless you share the password with them. It is important to keep strong password which you can easily recall. 

I have read so many questions over the discussion forum where user said they could not recall saved MS office password because it was very complex. In such situation I have given them suggestion to download some recognize Office Password Recovery utility to open the protected MS Office document. For my personal use I always opt for Stellar Phoenix Office Password Recovery utility to recover MS Office document password as it is user friendly and easily recover the password. I would recommend you to protect your MS office document you can surly give a try to this utility. Hope the above steps will surly help you to protect your MS office document.

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How to unprotect excel sheet from read only password ?

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Password protection is one of the most important features of MS Excel. Password protection feature ensures that only authorized user can see or modify the data of the excel file. This feature allows user to set (mainly) two types of password on excel file: Password to open and Password to modify. First type of password (Password to open) restricts the user from opening the excel file whereas second type of password (Password to modify) can be used to protect excel sheet (or cells) from unauthorized modification.

Many times it happens that the authorized user forget excel file password and hence they also lost access from opening/editing the excel file. In such situation most of the user take help of excel password remover software to recover lost password.

Here I am sharing how you can edit read only password protected excel file without any password remover software.

1. Login into your Gmail account.
   
   
2. Click on documents (or open http://docs.google.com/ after you have login into Gmail account).
   
3. Click Upload Document icon.
   
   
   
4. Browse the file you want to edit and upload it.
   
   
   
5. Now open the uploaded file with Google spreadsheet (Click File-> Open with ->Google Spreadsheets) and make the desired changes.
   
   
   
6. Download the edited file as an Excel file.
   
   
   
7. Now open the downloaded file. It will open in “Protected View”. Click “Enable Editing” to remove read only password permanently. 
   
   
   

Now your file is unprotected from read only password.

This is one of the best method to unprotect excel sheet without using any password remover software. The only limitation of this method is that it can not be used to remove “password to open” excel file. You can recover “password to open” excel file by using excel password recovery software.

READ MORE - How to unprotect excel sheet from read only password ?

Unprotect Excel Sheet with Brute-Force Attack and Masking Technique

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MS Excel provide many features to manage and analyze large volume of data. Graphical representation tools and inbuilt (mathematical, financial, statistical and logical) functions make it very easy for everyone to analyze and summarize data without any special expertise. Besides so many user friendly features, MS Excel also provides a very useful security feature called “Password Protection” to prevent unauthorized access (or modification) of valuable data. This password protection feature of MS Excel allows User to protect entire workbook, individual sheet or cells of a file. 

Many times it happens that Excel user forget the password enabled by them to protect their worksheet. In such situation it is really very difficult to unprotect excel sheet without password remover software. I searched a lot to find methods of removing excel password without software but did not get even a single method which can do this. From my search I analysed that almost all the excel password remover software are based on two features: Brute-Force Attack Technique and Masking Technique.

Let me explain you how Brute-Force Attack and Masking Technique help to unprotect excel sheet. 

Brute-Force Attack Technique – This technique involves making all possible permutations of characters (lower case letters, upper case letters, special characters, numbers) of your password. All excel password breaker software provides you the option to specify the probable length and characters in your password. On the basis of the password length and characters all possible permutations are made and run through for checking. Total time taken by software to recover excel password directly depends on the total number of permutations (which in turn depends on the length and complexity of your password). 

For example if your password is 3 characters long and include numbers, Upper case and lower case letters then there will be total 62 * 62 * 62 = 238328 guesses or permutations (Here 62 = 26 lower case letters +26 upper case letters + 10 numbers).

Masking Technique – Many time it happens that user remember first few (or any) characters of their password but not able to recall full password. In such situation Masking Technique allows user to specify the initial (remember) characters and replace the unknown characters by '?'. This helps Brute-Force process to search for the unknown characters only and hence reduces the time to crack excel password. 

Overall we can say that because of Brute-Force Attack and Masking Technique excel password remover software has very high success rate. So, if you forget your excel file password then you can use any excel password recovery software based on Brute-Force Attack and Masking Technique.

READ MORE - Unprotect Excel Sheet with Brute-Force Attack and Masking Technique

How to Solve the Problem “Outlook keeps asking for password”?

Many Outlook users complain that Outlook keeps asking for password (network password) repeatedly. Situation becomes worse when “Enter Network Password” pop-up message appears after every 20-30 seconds. Pop-up keeps on flashing even the user has entered correct username and password. Enabling the “Save Password” or “Remember Password” also does not solve the problem.

The possible reason for this problem can be:

• Corrupted Outlook profile.
• Registry has incorrect Protected Storage System information.

Solving corrupted Outlook profile problem:

This problem can be solved by creating a new outlook profile and connecting this profile to the .pst file of old profile (or damaged profile).

1. Create new outlook profile.
2. Locate the .pst file used by damaged profile (you can find it at location C:\Documents and Settings\ user_name \Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook\Personal Folders.pst).
3. Configure new profile to use .pst file of old profile. This can be done by following the given below steps (based on MS Outlook 2010):

1. Open Outlook.
2. File tab -> Info -> click Account Settings (in Outlook 2007 Account Settings option is available in Tool menu, in Outlook 2003 and 2002 Tool -> Options).
3. E-mail tab-> click your email account. (in Outlook 2003 and 2002 Mail Setup -> Email Accounts -> View or change existing e-mail accounts - > Next)
4. In the "Account Settings" dialog box Click "Change Folder".
5. Click New Outlook Data File-> click Office Outlook Personal Folders File-> click OK.
6. Browse and locate the .pst file of old profile-> click OK.

Solving Incorrect Registry information Problem:

1. Close all the programs
2. Click Start -> Run
3. Enter "Regedit" and Click "Ok"
4. Locate the folder : HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\User Shell Folders
5. Edit Menu-> New-> Expandable String Value
6. Name it as "AppData"
7. Double click new entry and write "%USERPROFILE%\Application Data" in "Value data field" box.
8. Click "OK" and Close the registry editor.

Note: Before following this solution make sure that you have created a backup copy of registry.

I hope that with the help of these two methods you can make outlook to remember your mail password. So no more complaints that Outlook keeps asking for password.

READ MORE - How to Solve the Problem “Outlook keeps asking for password”?