All I need now is your password…
Have you heard this before? For some reason in order for the IT department to provide me with a work laptop they need to know my username and password. This is totally wrong and you should never be required to disclose your password to anybody - despite what they tell you. The only thing someone can do with your account details that they can’t do as an Administrator is pretend to be you… In my particular instance it’s so they can set up my Exchange profile and VPN access. These are things I have no problem in doing myself.
If there is a real need for an Administrator to access your account then they can have your password reset, login, and then provide you with the password so that you can reset it. Slightly more hassle for them, but there’s an audit trail that would protect you if they used your account for anything illegal or against company policy.
Anyway, in order to get my laptop today (I’ve been waiting forever) I changed my password to the lame one they set up when you first get an account and e-mailed the guy back with it. I was suprised when I didn’t get some sarcastic comment back, but instead I got:
I should have known :)
Seems to be eveybodys
Lost for words… Oh, and fortunately I did at least confirm that the guy worked in the IT department before sending the e-mail. I’m sure that if I sent an e-mail to everyone in the building asking for their usernames and passwords I’d get 50% success, and of those probably half again have the same password!