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Windows the most widely used Operating System has many holes. With
some operations you can easily customize (hack) your Windows
Operating System. Now let?s see some usable and funny tips and
tricks..
Change the Windows start-up and shutdown screens:
Using this trick you can easily change the boring startup and
shutdown screens. In Windows the screens are stored in the disk as
logo.sys, logow.sys, logos.sys. Find them on the disk and open
them with ?Mspaint?. Now you can do any thing with these files.
You can even add your pics as the startup screen. But remember
that the width should be 320 pixels and height should be 400
pixels and save it the Windows directory as the
logo.sys/logow.sys/logos.sys.
Get out of Windows without warning:
Using this trick you can shutdown or restart your Windows without
any warning. For using this right-click on desktop and create a
short-cut and enter the command line as follows:
Shutting down: ?rundll.exe user.exe,exitwindows? (without
quotes)
Restarting: ?rundll.exe user.exe,exitwindowsexec? (without
quotes)
Note: you can even shutdown Windows by running this command in
Windows directory.
Catch your desktop:
To get the contents of your screen as an image file, press the
?print screen? key on your desktop and open Microsoft Paint and
click paste in the edit menu (or press Ctrl+V). You can it as an
image file.
Note: This trick doesn?t work for saving video screenshots. There
are many other freeware programs for taking the screenshots of a
video file.
Hack the Windows login passwords:
During Windows startup press F8 key (i.e., before the startup
splash screen) and select ?command prompt only?. Go to c:\windows
directory and delete the password file(*.pwl ? where * is the
username) and restart the system. When the password dialog box
pops up, type the username and enter any password. Windows should
accept any password.
Internet Explorer- Some tips to clean your tracks on your
system:
If you are using Internet Explorer for surfing the net, it is the
program which spies on your browsing habits and stores the files
you viewed in the hard disk. Any hacker by introducing a small
Trojan program to your system can easily know your surfing
habits.
Clear History:
The sites you visited over the internet with the Internet Explorer
engine are stored in the history folder in your Windows directory.
You can delete the entries in the history folder by clicking the
?Clear History? button in the Internet options dialog box. To
delete only a specific entry go the history folder in c:\windows
and delete the entry.
Remove the temporary internet files:
Internet Explorer stores the images and pages viewed through it in
the ?Temporary Internet Files? folder in c:\windows directory.
Delete the files in it by clicking the ?Delete Files? in the
Internet Options dialog box in Internet Explorer. You can even
delete the files by browsing through the ?Temporary Internet
Files? folder in Windows directory.
Remove Cookies:
Cookies are the files used by the websites to know information
about your last login to that site, your username in the site etc.
The information in these files is not user readable language. But,
the cookie name tells the name of the site you visited. Delete the
cookies by browsing through the ?Cookies? folder in Windows
directory.
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The above mentioned are some basic tricks you can play on Windows.
But, to really hack your Windows, there is no other better tool
than REGEDIT.
Working with registry:
Registry as its name indicates it is the central core registrar of
windows system. It contains all information about the programs
installed on the system and how to respond to inputs of the user.
Customizing windows is very easy by working with the registry. In
windows 95/98 the entire registry is stored in USER.DAT and
SYSTEM.DAT; in windows Me there is another file called
CLASSES.DAT. In windows NT/2000 the registry is stored in %system
root%\system32\config directory. But, you cannot edit these files
directly to change the values in registry. To change the registry
settings there is an utility in windows known as ?REGEDIT?. Using
this utility you can comfortably edit the registry to hack your
windoze.
The registry has a tree structure and it looks similar to windows
explorer. The entire registry is divided to six hives with further
have sub-keys and values. The six main hives in the windows
registry are
HKEY_USERS ? This hive contains all information about the settings
for each user on the system. If there is only one user then only
?.default? key will be present.
HKEY_CURRENT_USER ? This is the link to HKEY_USERS. It loads the
appropriate settings like desktop settings, start menu settings
etc. for the current logged on user.
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE - This hive contains all information about the
system starting from the hardware settings, software etc. to
information about the users on that system.
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT ? This hive contains all information about
windows shortcuts, file associations.
HKEY_CURRENT_CONFIG ? This is an alias to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE and
stores information about the current hardware configuration.
HKEY_DYN_DATA ? In this hive, changes in the values of registry
take place dynamically. So, this key is known a ?Dynamic Data
Key?.
The values to the sub-keys in the registry are defined by three
types.
String: This type is used to represent human readable values
Binary: In this type the information is stored in hexadecimal
format. It mainly stores information regarding hardware
configuration.
Dword: This is a Boolean format. To disable a Key change its value
to ?0? and ?1? to enable the key.
When you right click on any key in the left pane of registry, the
following options popup:
Expand: To expand the tree.
New: Creates a new key
Find: To find a sub-key in that key
Delete: Deletes the key
Rename: Renames the key
Copy Key Name: Copies the entire key
When you click on a key in the right pane the following options
popup:
Modify: Modifies the value of the key
Delete: Deletes the selected key
Rename: Renames the key
Registry Editor is included with the windows operating system. To
launch Registry Editor, click start and select run. In the Run
dialog box, type ?regedit? (without quotes) and click OK. You will
now see the Registry Editor launched to the screen. In the windows
registry you can neither add nor delete the main hives. You can
add or delete keys to these hives and even modify the values to
the keys.
With this concept you can easily hack your windows system. But, be
careful while working with registry. Editing the registry could
crash programs and even the entire Operating System.
Now we shall see some tricks you can play on windows registry to
customize (hack) your Windows using registry.
Run a program every time Windows starts:
You can run a program every time when the Windows startup. To do
this go ?HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Run? and
create a new string Value and modify its value to the path of the
program (Example: C:\program files\winamp\winamp.exe) you want to
start every time when Windows starts and restart the Windows. Your
program should automatically start on Windows startup.
Note: You can stop a program from loading at Windows startup by
removing the appropriate value from the ?Run? directory in
registry.
Display a notice every time Windows starts:
You can use this trick if you want a message to be displayed every
time Windows starts. Go to
?HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Winlogon?. Create a
new string values as follows.
Name: LegalNoticeCaption and Value: Caption of the dialog box
here
Name: LegalNoticeText and Value: Your message here
After adding the values, restart your Windows, a dialog box should
appear before the Windows startup.
Remove the ?shortcut to?? on shortcuts:
To do this go to the following key:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\windows\currentversion\explorer
Create a new Binary value with name ?Link? (without quotes) and
change its value to ?00 00 00 00?. Restart your system for
applying your new settings.
Automatically logon to Windows:
Using this operation you can logon to your personal settings
without every time typing your passwords. Go to the key
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Winlogon
And create a new string value with name ?Default Password?
(Without quotes) and modify its value to your exact password.
Note: The default username can be found at
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Network\Logon\username.
Remove the internet icon form Desktop:
Go to
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\E
xplorer
and Create a new DWORD value named ?NoInternetIcon? and set its
value to ?1?.
Disable the Shutdown command:
To disable the Shutdown command go to
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\E
xplorer
and create a new DWORD value ?NoClose?(Without quotes) and set
it?s value to ?1? (Without quotes). Restart the system for the new
settings to apply. To enable the Shutdown command change the value
of ?NoClose? to ?0? (Without quotes).
Hide icons on desktop:
To hide all the items on the desktop go to
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\E
xplorer
and create a new DWORD value ?NoDesktop? (Without quotes) and set
its value to ?1?. Restart the computer for the new settings to
take place.
Hide the Network Neighbourhood icon from desktop:
To do this operation go to
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\E
xplorer
and create a new DWORD value ?NoNetHood? (Without quotes) and set
it?s value to ?1? (Without quotes).
Automatically close Non-Responding programs:
In Windows often users encounter Non-responding programs due to
several reasons like low ram availability, low processing power
etc. This helps to close automatically the Non-responding programs
in Windows. To do this operation go to HKEY_USERS\.Default\Control
Panel\Desktop and a new string value to this folder. Ad name the
string value to ?AutoEndtasks? (Without quotes) and set it?s value
to ?1? (Without quotes).
Get the Windows update without registering with Microsoft:
Microsoft often releases updates to the Windows Operating System.
To receive these updates, Windows must be registered with
Microsoft. This tweak helps you to receive updates without
registering with Microsoft.
Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current
Version and create anew string value named ?RegDone? (Without
quotes) and set its value to ?1? (Without quotes).
Take control over the auto complete mode:
In Windows Operating System there is an option called auto
complete mode. This helps to avoid the repeated typing of the same
text in text boxes.
Go to
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\A
utocomplete
and create a new string value named ?Append Completion? (Without
quotes) and set it value to ?yes? (Without quotes) to enable the
auto completion and ?No? (Without quotes) to show only a list of
relevant text.
Model your explorer toolbars:
This helps you add an image to the background of your explorer
toolbar. To do this go to
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\toolbar and
add a new string value named ?BackBitmapShell? (Without quotes) to
it and set its value to the path of the image file.
Clear the recent documents on windows exit:
This tweak helps you to remove the recent documents upon exiting
the Windows. Go to
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\E
xplorer
and add a new DWORD valus named ?Clearrecentdocsonexit? (Without
quotes) and set its value to ?1?.
Customize your start menu:
In Windows the start menu acts as a barrier between the user and
the programs installed on the computer. But, the main Start menu
cannot be edited easily. To do this one should edit the registry.
All these operations are required to be done to the same key i.e.,
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\E
xplorer.
Remove Favorites from start menu:
Create a Dword value named ?Nofavoritesmenu? and set its value to
?1?
Remove folders from settings on the start menu:
Create a new DWORD value named ?NoSetFolders? (Without quotes) and
set its value to ?1?
Remove Documents folder from start menu:
Create a new DWORD value named ?NoRecentDocsMenu? and set its
value to ?1?.
Remove the help option from start menu:
Create a new DWORD value named ?NoSMHelp? and set its value to
?1?.
Remove My documents from documents in start menu:
Create a new DWORD value named ?NoSMMyDocs? and set its value to
?1?.
Remove the find command from start menu:
Create a new DWORD value named ?NoFind? and set its value to
?1?.
Remove Run command from start menu:
Create a new DWORD value named ?NoRun? and set its value to ?1?.
Remove the control panel from start menu:
Create a new DWORD value named ?NoControlPanel? and set its value
to ?1?.
Remove the taskbar from the settings option on start menu:
Create a new DWORD value named ?NoSetTaskbar? and set its value to
?1?.
Disable shutdown:
Create a new DWORD value named ?NoClose? and set its value to
?1?.
Note: To disable any registry value mentioned above change its
value form ?1? to ?0?.
Hack Internet Explorer:
Hiding the Internet Explorer icon from desktop:
To do this go to
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\E
xplorer
and create a new DWORD value named ?NoInternetIcon? and set its
value to ?1?.
Disable the Go Button in Internet Explorer:
Go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main
and create a new string value named ?ShowGoButton? and set its
value to ?no?.
Change the Internet Explorer Search Engine:
Go to ?HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet
Explorer\Search url? and create a new string value named ?Default?
(Without quotes) and set its value to the address of the search
Engine. (Example: For Altavista the value should be
?http://www.altavista.com/cgi-bin/query?q=%s?)
Changing the Internet Explorer window title:
Just go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet
Explorer\Main and create a string value named ?Window Title? with
the new caption as its value.
Hidden features in Internet Explorer 5 and above versions:
Internet Explorer 5 comes with many hidden features. These
features make Internet Explorer 5 more customizable than its
previous versions.
Add a background bitmap to the Internet Explorer toolbar:
One can easily add a bitmap to the Internet Explorer toolbar. Go
to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Toolbar
and create a new string value named ?BackBitmapIE5?(for Internet
Explorer 5) and set the path of the bitmap as it value.
Customize Internet Explorer 5:
The following all values are to be added to
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Internet
Explorer\Restrictions for playing the trick. Set the values of the
below give DWORD values to ?1? to enable it and ?0? to disable
it.
Disable closing Internet Explorer: NoBrowserClose
Hide the Internet Options dialog box: NoBrowserOptions
Disable Save As..: NoBrowserSaveAs
Disable New command in File menu: NoFileMenu
Disable Full screen option: NoTheaterMode
Disable the right-click context menu: NoBrowserContextMenu
CLSID folders- What they really are?
In Windows Operating System, the system folders are protected from
accidental deletion. Each system folder is represented by a
16-bit value known as CLSID value in the Windows registry. These
values point to the specific system folders. These values are
stored in the registry in ?HKCR\CLSID?. Below given are some of
the CLSID values of some folders
Recycle Bin- {645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F9554E}
Network Neighbourhood- {208D2C60-3AEA-1069-A2D7-O8002B30309D}
My Computer- {20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D}
Control Panel- {21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D}
My Briefcase- {85BBD920-42AO-1069-A2E4-08002B30309D}
History- {FF393560-C2A7-11CF-BFF4-444553540000}
Printers- {2227A280-3AEA-1069-A2DE-O8002B0309D}
Dial-up Networking- {992CFFA0-F557-101A-88EC-00DD01CCC48}
Fonts- {BD84B380-8CA2-1069-AB1D-08000948534}
To delete a folder simply delete the corresponding value to the
folder in the above key mentioned.
Note: To delete a key from the desktop go to
?HKLM|Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Desktop\Names
pace?
and delete the corresponding key.
Customize the right-click menu of the CLSID folders:
The above explained process is not an efficient one to delete the
system folders. There is another method by which you can
customize the right-click menu of the folder after which you can
delete the folder or even rename the folder. Let?s look at this
process.
This operation deals with editing the DWORD value of ?attributes?
in the shellfolder of the corresponding CLSID folder. To do this
go to
?HKCR\CLSID\{CLSID VALUE}\Shellfolder? and find the DWORD value
named ?Attributes? in it and change its value to
the following values according to your requirement.
70 01 00 20 ?Adds both rename and delete to the menu
50 01 00 20 ? Adds only rename option to the menu
60 01 00 20 ? Adds only delete to the menu
47 01 00 20 ? Adds cut, copy, paste to the menu
40 01 00 20 ? Changes the menu to its default condition
Now you can do anything to the folders. But, remember editing
these values could eve crash your system. So, be careful while
editing them.
Playing with Explorer.exe:
Explorer is like the heart to Windows Operating System. It is
mainly responsible for the originating windows in Windows OS.
So,
the life of Windows lies in Explorer.exe. Now we shall see editing
this file. Remember, editing explorer.exe is a complicate
issue to take a backup of all the important data you have and also
have a copy of explorer.exe.
You can use DOS for hex-editing your explorer.exe or even any .exe
file.
Change the ?Start? text on Start button:
To do this restart your computer in MS-Dos and go to C:\Windows>
and type the following command.
?edit /70 explorer.exe? (without quotes). The /70 option helps you
to see only 70 columns on the screen. It is in the line 2390 of
the editor window, there is a text ?S t a r t?. Now you can
replace the text on start button with any word of 5 characters.
Simply replace the letters in ?S t a r t? with any the required
letters with null characters (remember not spaces) in between
them.
Example: Replace the ?S t a r t? with ?S n e h a?.
If by mistake you typed a space between the letters, copy a null
character from the remaining document and paste it over the
typed space.
Change the text over Clear button in Taskbar properties:
Follow the same procedure to open the Dos editor and to the line
1354 in the editor. You can find the word ?& C l e a r?. Now
just replace the word with any other word with exactly 5
characters. The ?&? signifies the shortcut key for the operation
i.e., the
command gets executed when you press ?Alt + C?.
Example: I changed the ?& C l e a r? to ?& S n e h a?.
Restart your computer for the settings to take place. Like wise
there are many operations that you can do to change the taskbar
properties and start menu items. All these can be found in between
the lines 1336 to 2348. But be careful while editing it.
Note: The lines mentioned here are with reference to explorer.exe
in a Win98 system. These lines may vary with explorer.exe in other
OSs.
That?s it for now. In my next article I will be dealing with
hacking rediffmail passwords by tricking fake login screen. So,
stay tuned to astalavista.com
regards
pradeep kishnani
rockystone@rediffmail.com
Disclaimer: Editing the registry and explorer.exe is a complicate
issue. Operations above mentioned could even crash your system.
So, always maintain a back-up copy while editing the registry or
explorer.exe. Perform the operations at your own risk. I am not
responsible for any kind of damage.
pradeep kishnani
rockystone@rediffmail.com
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