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Admin name change, password requirement

How do I delete/change my admin name? Also I have tried and tried to get rid of the password requirement to login? Can anyone help with these?

MacBook Air 13", macOS 10.14

Posted on Jun 8, 2019 7:46 PM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Jun 8, 2019 10:32 PM

Hi moongoddess63,


Getting rid of your administrator password entirely is a serious security threat. Anyone can make system-wide changes to your Mac and can even enable the superuser with little to no effort. In addition, if you have any passwords stored on your Mac, anyone could access your passwords and hack into your accounts. I recommend keeping your admin password and simply delaying or turning off Screen Lock:


  1. Open System Preferences, then select Security and Privacy.
  2. Select the General tab.
  3. Next to "Require a password after sleep or screen saver begins", change the delay or deselect the checkbox. This setting affects when your password is required to resume your session (when you're already logged in).
    1. WARNING: If you turn off Screen Lock and iCloud Keychain is enabled, your Mac will prompt you to remove your iCloud Keychain passwords. KEEP YOUR PASSWORDS; if you choose to erase them then they will be removed from ALL of your devices. To remove your passwords from only your Mac, go to iCloud preferences and deselect iCloud Keychain.


If you still really want to remove the administrator password, you could try going to Users and Groups preferences (inside System Preferences) and changing the password for your account. I don't know if this is possible or not, but hopefully macOS will accept nothing in the "New Password" field. Take note, though, that this may be impossible with FileVault enabled, as your password is used as a key into the startup disk.


In regards to changing your user account name, please see this support article: Change the name of your macOS user account and home folder - Apple Support

1 reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Jun 8, 2019 10:32 PM in response to moongoddess63

Hi moongoddess63,


Getting rid of your administrator password entirely is a serious security threat. Anyone can make system-wide changes to your Mac and can even enable the superuser with little to no effort. In addition, if you have any passwords stored on your Mac, anyone could access your passwords and hack into your accounts. I recommend keeping your admin password and simply delaying or turning off Screen Lock:


  1. Open System Preferences, then select Security and Privacy.
  2. Select the General tab.
  3. Next to "Require a password after sleep or screen saver begins", change the delay or deselect the checkbox. This setting affects when your password is required to resume your session (when you're already logged in).
    1. WARNING: If you turn off Screen Lock and iCloud Keychain is enabled, your Mac will prompt you to remove your iCloud Keychain passwords. KEEP YOUR PASSWORDS; if you choose to erase them then they will be removed from ALL of your devices. To remove your passwords from only your Mac, go to iCloud preferences and deselect iCloud Keychain.


If you still really want to remove the administrator password, you could try going to Users and Groups preferences (inside System Preferences) and changing the password for your account. I don't know if this is possible or not, but hopefully macOS will accept nothing in the "New Password" field. Take note, though, that this may be impossible with FileVault enabled, as your password is used as a key into the startup disk.


In regards to changing your user account name, please see this support article: Change the name of your macOS user account and home folder - Apple Support

Admin name change, password requirement

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