Quickly Abort Shut Down Commands on Windows XP/2003

How can I quickly abort a shutdown command on Windows XP/2003?

Some worms, such as the Blaster worm, use known bugs in Microsoft Operating Systems to force the computer to shut down itself.

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Best Practice: In order to protect yourself from such worms and malicious code you should first make sure that your computer is fully patched. Then, make sure you’re using either the built-in Internet Connection Firewall (found in Windows XP and Windows Server 2003). Last but not least, you should make sure you’re running a good and trustworthy Anti-Virus program that’s fully updated.

Besides following the above guidelines you might also want to create a nice shortcut for a command that will allow to to quickly abort any un-wanted shutdown command you might get.

In order to create the "Anti-Shutdown" shortcut follow these steps:

  1. Right-click an empty spot on your desktop and select New > Shortcut.

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  1. In the Create Shortcut wizard windows type:

shutdown.exe -a

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Click Next.

  1. In the Select Title type any title you want.

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Click Finish.

You can also change the shortcut’s icon by right-clicking it, and pressing the Change Icon button in the Shortcut tab.

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BTW, you can also use this trick on Windows 2000, but there you’ll need to download SHUTDOWN.EXE from HERE (11kb).

Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 have the SHUTDOWN.EXE command built-in.

Whenever you see a shutdown message on your screen:

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you can use the Anti-Shutdown shortcut to abort it.

Lamer tip: As stated above, seeing shutdown messages on YOUR computer without YOU ever issuing such a command clearly states that it is NOT your computer anymore and that you didn’t follow the best practice described above.

Reader Note: Reader Rubin Sergey wrote:

"Related your tip about quick preventing shutdown. In addition to shutdown -a one can double click on the clock (near the system tray) and go few months backwards. So, Shutdown counter will be appropriately updated after applying new time/Date values."

Thanks!

Links

Windows XP Common Issues > RPC Blaster Exploitlink out ico

Tip derived from: www.microsoft.com/israel/windowsxp/expertzonelink out ico