Windows 10: W10 Phantom user account

I recently had a catastrophic failure of my SSD C drive. I'm up and running and working fine.


My main user account is "Thomas Lowe" but there is another user account listed on the C drive as "tom". Now when I install software the settings are often stored in the appdata folder under that user.


The user "tom" does not show up in the user accounts, it does not show up in "netplwz", but it shows up in the registry many times.


One other anomaly is the my "Google Back up and Sync" has a "Google Drive" folder in both user folders, and if I place a new file in the google drive folder, the file will immediately show up in both user folder.


How the heck do I remove this user account. It's driving me crazy. I have done quite a bit of searching and none of the solutions have worked.

:)

 

Phantom User Account

What "user list" are you talking about specifically? Where exactly do you see this extra account?

There is "User Accounts" applet in Control Panel. There's "Users" list in Computer Management applet. There is user list that drops down from your name in Start Menu (if you have Fast User Switching enabled). There is user list on Welcome screen (for interactive users). There is a list of user profiles in Advanced System Settings... Etc etc etc.

Do you see that mysterious user in all of these places? Some of them? Just one of them?


Anyway, what you are seeing must be this

oymlgoleopw user account - ESET Beta Products for Home Users - ESET Security Forum
Unknown User Account - ESET Smart Security - ESET Security Forum

The account is created by Anti Theft feature of ESET Smart Security, if you have that feature enabled.

 

W10 phantom user account...how do I get rid of it

Please open the Command Prompt by typing cmd.exe into Start Menu, right-click on Cmd.exe, and open it as an administrator.

Execute following command to find out if it list "phantom" account:

Code:

Execute following command to delete "phantom" user account:

Code:

 

How to find phantom user account to delete it

When I turn on the PC every day, the W10 login screen defaults to a 'phantom' login with the correct user name, but lacking a usable password option. Whatever password it wants, I don't have it.

I then click on a second option which is the same correct user name, but is actually my MS account, with my Outlook.com email address, password and PIN. I can then proceed to login. It's my correct Administrator account with all related information running
perfectly.

I cannot find the alternate 'phantom' user account that the computer initially defaults to every day, and which doesn't work. When I search for it, the 'phantom' account doesn't pop up as a Guest or Administrator account under User Accounts, so I can't remove
it. It's in there somewhere, but how to find it?

A fix would be gratefully appreciated, as it adds unnecessary steps every time I logon to my computer.