Understanding Well-Known Security Principals, Part 2

Last month, in "Understanding Well-Known Security Principals, Part 1," InstantDoc ID 47857, you learned that Windows well-known security principals (a special category of security principals that the Windows security subsystem predefines and controls) are powerful tools for managing and maintaining security. You saw how these wellknown security principals control and simplify administering access to Windows resources. Remember that Windows defines the well-known security principals: You can't create, rename, or delete them, and they're the same for all Windows systems. This month, we look at details of the individual well-known security principals. I'll show you the Windows features that use the well-known security principals and provide a few tips for how to use them effectively.

Authenticated Users and Everyone
The Authenticated Users well-known security principal includes all users that Windows authenticates through a valid set of user credentials at logon. Authenticated Users includes all users who have valid credentials in the forest and its domains, and users from other forests who access resources in the local forest through valid credentials and a forest or external inter-forest trust relationship. . . .