Hiding Users on the Logon Screen

One of the features of the new logon screen is the list of all the user accounts on the computer. What if you created an account for running services? You do not want other users of your computer to have the option to log on to that account, because you designated it only to be used by applications running as a service. Maybe you have a secret user account that you don't want anyone to see. With the help of a simple registry tweak, it is possible to hide any account on the logon screen so no one will know it exists.

Hidden away in the registry is the feature that Microsoft used in the past to hide system accounts from the logon screen. In the next few steps, I show you how to re-create the missing registry code so that you can use this feature again to hide your accounts:

1. Click the Start button, type regedit in the Search box, and then press Enter.
2. When Registry Editor loads, navigate through HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, SOFTWARE, Microsoft, Windows NT, CurrentVersion, and Winlogon.
3. You must now create a new key. Right-click the Winlogon folder, select New, and then select Key. Name this new key SpecialAccounts.
4. Right-click the new SpecialAccounts key, select New, and then select Key. Call this new key UserList.
5. Now you are ready to add the name of the account that you want to hide. To add a name, right-click and select a new DWORD (32-bit) value.
6. When the new DWORD is created, enter the name of the user's account as the name of the DWORD. After you have done this, you can close the Registry Editor.

After you log off and back on or reboot, the user will not be displayed on the logon screen. If you want to hide all accounts and just have a User name and Password box, the next section is for you. If you opt for that method, you can hide all accounts and still log on to them. You just need to remember the username and the password because no accounts will be listed anymore.

If you ever change your mind and want the account to display on the logon screen again, just delete the DWORD that you made in the system registry, and everything will be back to the way it once was.