something is afoot on my computer...

[Taffy]

I'm running XP, so as I'm sure most of you know, you can change your account details. So I went to do so just a minute ago, and I discovered that as well as their being the four user areas we set up (one for each member of the family) and the default guest one (switched off), there was an additional one, titled

ASP.NET Machine A...

Now we didn't set this up. I don't know when it appeared or for what reason, but we didn't create it. It's a limited account, password protected, but the REALLY strange thing is that it appears to be hidden from view. In other words, it doesn't show up on the welcome screen. So, my question is this: is it supposed to be there?

 

[elDiablo]

Bingo bango, Jimbo!

To quote the easiest bit to read:

The aspnet_wp or ASP.NET Machine Account is created when the Microsoft .Net Framework 1.1 is installed onto a Windows XP computer. The user is created to run the asp.net worker process used in Microsoft's Internet Information Services, which allows ASP.net to run on your local web server (This is pretty much its only use, it is not used to run normal .net managed executables). There is not a need to worry about this user's presence; it was not created in malicious way.

.

In other words, it's Windows being stupid and annoying. Remove it, assuming that you do not do any ASP.NET programming/development on your machine, which I'm guessing you don't as you don't know about the account.

Enjoy.

 

[Ronin Storm]

I concur with elD, though I'd tend to leave the user in place and disable the account if you're concerned.