Taskbar's Desktop Position Locked But Overriden

Hello All

I have locked down a couple of desktops (Win 7 HP and not internet facing) at our local nursery such that the kids can't move the taskbar, can't access Personalisation or CP, change themes etc.

I used the MS GPEdit settings to do this via manual registry edits.

Every couple of months, however, I get a call that the kids have somehow repositioned the taskbar to across the top of the desktop despite my having locked it to across the bottom.

Not the end of the world but I and the staff there would love to know how they're doing this - especially since all my lockdowns still apply when I go to sort this; I can't move the taskbar myself!!

The following are all set to 1 at HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer

LockTaskBar
NoSetTaskBar
TaskBarLockAll
TaskBarNoAddRemoveToolBar

I don't recall the keys I added to close off Personalisation and CP but I do know that these still work when I try to get access!

The kids are running under LUA and I switch the account to Admin to make any lockdown tweaks requested by the staff and then I switch the kids' account back to LUA when I'm done (making sure I reboot and test).

When I've left after making+testing all these settings, there is absolutely no way I can find of moving the taskbar but then after a few weeks I get that call...

Anyone understand how they are doing this?

Cheers

philby

 

Hi, sorry i can't help with a solution, but it "might" not be the kid/s doing it ?

Also just because they don't have internet access, doesn't mean something/s dodgy etc can't get in there, via USB sticks/drives & CD Roms etc ?

 

Hi CloneRanger

I did raise this possibility with the manager but I think it's unlikely that anyone there is (in)competent and/or malicious enough to tinker. The kids are very click-happy and create all kinds of keyboard shortcut sequences and I think every few weeks one of them hits on a way of shifting the taskbar - a la monkey/typewriter/Shakespeare.

Understood - though this mysterious taskbar migration is the only immediately obvious sign of odd behaviour. (I have checked out PE and scanned with MBAM and run SFC just in case and can't see anything unusual).

The moving taskbar being on both machines makes me think I've missed a setting somewhere to complete the taskbar lockdowns... but I can't think what this could be as I've tested the reg. settings above on my 7 and 8 machines and they work - I cannot move the taskbar at all.

 

Thank you!

You're right - that key at 0 prevents taskbar relocation all by itself ( I tried it with the others I listed 'off').
I'll go in and set that today. Might take a while to verify effectiveness though - will have to let the little people have their way with the keyboard first...

 

JRViejo - I said I'd post back...

They've done it again!!

Went there briefly today and taskbar was across top of desktop...
Tried to move it myself and got 'Admin says you can't' as per my settings every time. I could find no way of moving it back. These kids are unbelievable and I'm looking pretty incompetent.

I checked all my reg. settings are still good, including the one you pointed me to above, and they're all still in place.

Could they be doing this with some bizarre keyboard / mouse manoeuvre??

Spooky...

Cheers

philby

 

Thank you JR - already had that one nailed, but have managed to track down Win7 bug that the little people must be 'exploiting'.

Even if the TB is locked from just about every registry direction, if you right-click on any open program's icon in the TB, leave the subsequent context menu open and then simply touch the TB elsewhere, it immediately flies up to top of screen and is then impossible to bring back down without unlocking all the registry settings originally applied. I was able to replicate this on my 7 SP1 at home...

I found details of the bug here and here and even a specific MS fix for the exact symptoms here!!

Only trouble is, the fix won't run as the 2 machines are pre-SP1 and offline, so will have to wait until I can update them from SP1 disk and try fix again...

Thanks very much for your help!

philby

 

Haha that is a pretty neat bug.