Do you think someone was logging into your Windows PC while you were away? If your dog was unable to locate the culprit, we have some helpful ways to find out if your computer was accessed. They may not have left a physical clue, but most likely left evidence somewhere in Windows. Find out if anyone else is logging into your Windows computer using any combination of the following methods.

Recent activity in Jump Lists

Current versions of Windows 10 no longer show recent activity other than recently added apps in the Start menu. Skip to the next section if you’re using an earlier version of Windows 10 or earlier versions of Windows.

However, you can view the files that you recently accessed by right-clicking on applications in the Start menu and on the taskbar. Want to check if someone has opened a Word document? Open any Word document, right-click its tray icon (this also works if you have a shortcut pinned to the taskbar) and search for Recent.

You can do the same from the Start menu. Right-click any app that you think someone might have accessed to view recent items, including browser items. However, if the browser automatically clears its history on exiting, nothing can be displayed.

Alternatively, open File Explorer and see the “Quick Access” section.

You may need to enable this setting if it is not enabled by default. Go to “Start -> Settings -> Personalization -> Start”.

Make sure “Show recently opened items in Jump Lists on the Start menu or on the taskbar and in File Explorer Quick Access” is selected.

Recent Activity (earlier versions of Windows and Windows 10)

Let’s start with the basics. If someone got access to your account, they must have used it for something. You should check for changes on your computer that are not coming from you.

The starting point will be the last program that appears in the Start menu. Click on the Start menu to see the latest open programs. You’ll only see the change if an intruder has accessed a program that you haven’t used recently.

One downside is that they can always remove an item from here if they’re smart enough. Also, if the Recent Items view was enabled on your computer, hover over the “Recent Items” button on the right side of the Start menu and you will see all recently opened files. The file entry will remain there even if the actual files are deleted.

Other common places to look for changes are your browser history, recent documents, and the “Programs” option in the control panel for recently added programs.

Check the Windows Event Viewer

The previous step was to warn you that something is wrong. Let’s take it seriously and look for hard evidence if you suspect someone else is logging into your Windows PC. Windows keeps a complete registry when the account has successfully logged in and failed logon attempts. You can see it in the Windows Event Viewer.

To access Windows Event Viewer, pressWygrać+Rand writeeventvwr.mscin the “Run” dialog box. After pressing the Enter key the Event Viewer will open.

In the left pane, expand “Windows Logs” and select “Security”.

In the middle pane, you’ll see several login entries with date and time stamps. Each time you log in, Windows logs multiple logon entries over a combined period of two to four minutes. Concentrate on when these entries were entered. Look for times when you are not actively logged in.

If there is an entry, it means that someone has gained access to your computer. Windows won’t make fake entries, so you can trust this data. In addition, you can also check which specific account was accessed during this period (if you have multiple accounts). To check this, double-click the “Special Login” entry during this period and the “Event Properties” will open. Here you will see the account name next to “Account Name”.

If you want to check logins regularly, you can set up custom views in Event Viewer.

Show last login details on startup

The above method is pretty solid at catching an intruder, but if they were smart enough, they could wipe out all the event logs. In that case, you can set the latest login credentials to appear as soon as you start your computer. This will show when the account was last logged in and any failed attempts. This information cannot be removed, but it can only help with future unauthorized access as you will set it up below.

You’ll be editing the Windows registry for this, so make sure you back it up. pressWygrać+Rand enterregeditthe Run dialog to open the Windows Registry.

In the Registry, you need to go to the location listed below:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE SOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesSystem

Right-click the “System” folder and select “DWORD Value” from the “New” option. An entry ready for renaming will be created; You have to name it “DisplayLastLogonInfo”.

Double-click this entry and set its value to “1”. Now, every time you (or someone else) logs into your computer, you will see first when you were last logged in and failed attempts.

Check your browser history

If your browser automatically deletes history when you close it, that won’t help. If not, many people forget to erase their history when using someone else’s computer without permission. Just open your browser (s) and access your history via the Settings menu for your specific browser.

Ending

The above methods should be able to warn you of any unauthorized access. However, they won’t tell you “who” actually accessed your account. So yeah, you’re gonna have to do a little more research outside of the computer. However, figuring out ways to track computer activity can help pinpoint suspects.

Remember that if someone is using your account and they are smart enough to cover their tracks, they are hard to catch. Always log out of your account if you leave your computer to prevent someone from using your account.

If you know of other ways to find out if someone is logging into your Windows PC behind your back, please share with us in the comments below.