Jan 19

Written by: Senthil Prabakaran
1/19/2007 4:21 AM

The Windows Security model consist of a security principal, secured resource, security identifier and security privileges.

The security principal is the user or computer. Each process runs in the context of the user or computer principal.

Resources are secured by means of a security identifier. The security identifier contains information about what principals can do with the resource.

When a process tries to manipulate resources, an authorization check is performed to see if the action is allowed for the principal. If it is not allowed, access is denied, otherwise, the action proceeds.

Security privileges are configured on a computer to allow or to deny certain actions that are not tied to any resource.

With User Account Control, processes are executed under low privileges even if the user has administrative privileges. User Account Control asks the user if they intended a higher privileged task and hence gets around rogue processes and components.

User Account Control is a workaround to the limitations of the Windows Security model. The granularity of a process (or thread) as a unit for assuming identity for security is obviously insufficient.

The security model needs to be revisited and re-architected from the group up to encompass new realities.

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