Macintosh OS X Notebooks

Enabling password protection on Macintosh computers involves the following two steps:

1. Configuring password protection
2. Disabling auto-logon

Detailed instructions for these two steps are provided below.

Configuring Password Protection on Macintosh OS X

1. Click on the Apple icon located on the top left corner of your Mac screen.  This will present you with a menu as shown in Figure 1.

            Figure 1

2. Select “System Preferences” (see Figure 2.)

   

Figure 2

3. Once in System Preferences, select the “Accounts” option.  You will be presented with a list of all of the  local login accounts that exist on your system (see Figure 3 for an example).

4.  Click on the "Login Options” button.  NOTE:  To access these login options you may need to click on the lock located at the bottom left of the screen and type in an administrative password.

Figure 3 

5. Click on the name of the account that you would like to use to login. 

6. To change the password associated with the account, click on the "Change Password" button and type a new password.

Disabling Auto-Logon on Macintosh OS X

1. Follow steps 1, 2 and 3 listed above under "Configuring Password Protection".

2. The “Login Options” screen provides the options to turn off the Automatic Logon setting.  If the “Automatic log in as” is checked, you should uncheck this option. 

3.  Select "Name and password" for the “Display login window as:”  option. This will limit the ability for someone to know what ID to target in order to get into the system.

Figure 4 

You have now successfully enabled password protection on your Macintosh OS X system.