Microsoft® Windows® Internals: Microsoft Windows Server™ 2003, Windows XP, and Windows 2000, 4th Edition

Account Rights and Privileges

Many operations performed by processes as they execute cannot be authorized through object access protection because they do not involve interaction with a particular object. For example, the ability to bypass security checks when opening files for backup is an attribute of an account, not of a particular object. Windows uses both privileges and account rights to allow a system administrator to control what accounts can perform security-related operations.

A privilege is the right of an account to perform a particular system-related operation, such as shutting down the computer or changing the system time. An account right grants or denies the account to which it's assigned the ability to perform a particular type ...