3 ms·

Here's the thing: sometimes the lock screen on Windows 10 doesn't work and you can get back to the desktop simply by swiping up even when you think you should h

Here's the thing: sometimes the lock screen on Windows 10 doesn't work and you can get back to the desktop simply by swiping up even when you think you should have to re-enter your password or PIN. Note that I have face ID disabled because I got really fed up of my computer unlocking itself just because I'd gone back to my desk to pick up something I'd forgotten when I locked it and walked away. This always seemed incredibly insecure to me, not to mention very annoying.

Leparamour 6y ago
>you can get back to the desktop simply by swiping What exactly do you mean by "swiping up"? Are you using Win10 on a tablet?
- bartread 6y ago
  I have a Dell XPS laptop equipped with a touchscreen.
gregmac 6y ago
Having used Windows 10 basically since it came out, on many different devices, I've never experienced this, and I lock my PC every time I step away (or at least I did when I was working in an office). I also can't find anyone discussing it, though admittedly the search terms for this are difficult (mostly all I can find is people complaining their screen doesn't auto-lock after timeout). Can you provide anything else on this, rather than just casually claiming one of the most popular OSes has a massive security bug?
- bartread 6y ago
  Not really, only to say that it's happened to me several times, and isn't something I've been able to reproduce. It happens infrequently enough that the first handful of times I thought I must have just forgotten to lock the machine. Eventually I realised that wasn't so and I wasn't just imagining it because, of course, by this time I'd become ultra-paranoid about locking the thing. I'm running a ~2 year old Dell XPS equipped with a touchscreen. It's a decent machine for my needs but nothing special or exotic, and certainly I can't see any reason why this would be an issue. I don't know what else to tell you other than I wish I was making it up.
iudqnolq 6y ago
By default it locks five minutes after the screen goes black. Is that what you're talking about?
- bartread 6y ago
  No, not at all. I've had it happen after leaving the machine much longer than that. The thing is it happens quite infrequently, and isn't behaviour I can reproduce on demand, so I've not been able to reliably isolate the set of conditions that cause the problem. As I said in another comment, the first few times I thought I must simply have forgotten to lock the machine. But of course then I became paranoid about locking the machine and so when it continued to happen from time to time I realised something really wasn't quite right. Like I say though, it's just not behaviour I can reproduce on demand - super annoying. It's most likely some quirk of my machine configuration, or possibly a driver issue (though I tend to like to keep things up to date), but I have a super-unadventurous Dell XPS so it doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
stordoff 6y ago
I've never been able to recreate it, but I have been dumped back at the desktop without entering my password on one occasion. The machine didn't appear to be responding at the lock screen, so I hit enter a couple of times then tried Ctrl-Alt-Del. The screen went blue (the same blue as the screen that normally shows Lock/Switch User/Task Manager after pressing Ctrl-Alt-Del at desktop), then after 3-4 seconds just put me back at the desktop. FWIW, this was a somewhat buggy install of Windows 10 (Settings->Devices->Add a Bluetooth device would crash reliably), so I don't particularly expect this to be widespread/reproducible.
- bartread 6y ago
  Yeah, it's definitely a weird one. I don't remember ever experiencing it with other machines but the reality is that since 2015 I've only actually used Windows 10 with three other computers: 1. A Dell desktop machine with no touchscreen or camera back in 2016, 2. My Macbook Pro, in 2016/17, where I used Windows 10 as a Parallels VM, 3. An Intel powered Surface laptop that I used at work from 2017 - 2019. I don't remember any issues with the desktop machine. With the Mac I used the OSX screen lock so it was a complete non-issue (of course Windows would still lock itself but I wasn't careful about locking it manually). The Surface was so wrought with glitches and problems that the lock screen not working properly would have been the absolute least of them. It was one of the worst and least reliable computers I've ever had to tolerate, bested in this regard only by my ZX Spectrum 48K+ back in 1986/87, and the Spectrum +2A that followed it in 1988/89. An awful, overpriced, underspecced paperweight of a computer. Avoid.

Leparamour 6y ago

>you can get back to the desktop simply by swiping What exactly do you mean by "swiping up"? Are you using Win10 on a tablet?

bartread 6y ago
I have a Dell XPS laptop equipped with a touchscreen.

gregmac 6y ago

Having used Windows 10 basically since it came out, on many different devices, I've never experienced this, and I lock my PC every time I step away (or at least I did when I was working in an office). I also can't find anyone discussing it, though admittedly the search terms for this are difficult (mostly all I can find is people complaining their screen doesn't auto-lock after timeout). Can you provide anything else on this, rather than just casually claiming one of the most popular OSes has a massive security bug?

bartread 6y ago
Not really, only to say that it's happened to me several times, and isn't something I've been able to reproduce. It happens infrequently enough that the first handful of times I thought I must have just forgotten to lock the machine. Eventually I realised that wasn't so and I wasn't just imagining it because, of course, by this time I'd become ultra-paranoid about locking the thing. I'm running a ~2 year old Dell XPS equipped with a touchscreen. It's a decent machine for my needs but nothing special or exotic, and certainly I can't see any reason why this would be an issue. I don't know what else to tell you other than I wish I was making it up.

iudqnolq 6y ago

By default it locks five minutes after the screen goes black. Is that what you're talking about?

bartread 6y ago
No, not at all. I've had it happen after leaving the machine much longer than that. The thing is it happens quite infrequently, and isn't behaviour I can reproduce on demand, so I've not been able to reliably isolate the set of conditions that cause the problem. As I said in another comment, the first few times I thought I must simply have forgotten to lock the machine. But of course then I became paranoid about locking the machine and so when it continued to happen from time to time I realised something really wasn't quite right. Like I say though, it's just not behaviour I can reproduce on demand - super annoying. It's most likely some quirk of my machine configuration, or possibly a driver issue (though I tend to like to keep things up to date), but I have a super-unadventurous Dell XPS so it doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

stordoff 6y ago

I've never been able to recreate it, but I have been dumped back at the desktop without entering my password on one occasion. The machine didn't appear to be responding at the lock screen, so I hit enter a couple of times then tried Ctrl-Alt-Del. The screen went blue (the same blue as the screen that normally shows Lock/Switch User/Task Manager after pressing Ctrl-Alt-Del at desktop), then after 3-4 seconds just put me back at the desktop. FWIW, this was a somewhat buggy install of Windows 10 (Settings->Devices->Add a Bluetooth device would crash reliably), so I don't particularly expect this to be widespread/reproducible.

bartread 6y ago
Yeah, it's definitely a weird one. I don't remember ever experiencing it with other machines but the reality is that since 2015 I've only actually used Windows 10 with three other computers: 1. A Dell desktop machine with no touchscreen or camera back in 2016, 2. My Macbook Pro, in 2016/17, where I used Windows 10 as a Parallels VM, 3. An Intel powered Surface laptop that I used at work from 2017 - 2019. I don't remember any issues with the desktop machine. With the Mac I used the OSX screen lock so it was a complete non-issue (of course Windows would still lock itself but I wasn't careful about locking it manually). The Surface was so wrought with glitches and problems that the lock screen not working properly would have been the absolute least of them. It was one of the worst and least reliable computers I've ever had to tolerate, bested in this regard only by my ZX Spectrum 48K+ back in 1986/87, and the Spectrum +2A that followed it in 1988/89. An awful, overpriced, underspecced paperweight of a computer. Avoid.