Patent ID: 7376838

Claim:
A method for allowing a user to temporarily gain access to a privileged account on a computer system to perform a maintenance task, the method being a replacement for a conventional switch user command, comprising: receiving a switch user command login with a user id and an account name as an argument; retrieving a list of privileged account names; determining whether the account name is in a list of privileged account names and diverting the user to the conventional switch user command prompt if the account name is not in the privileged account list; otherwise, determining whether the user id is in a list of user ids having permission to access privileged accounts and allowing access to the account if the user id is in the list of user ids having permission to access privileged accounts; prompting for a reason for accessing the account; recording a reason for accessing the account; notifying a manager of the privileged account of the login; recording keystrokes in a log file while logged into the account; terminating the login; and notifying the manager of the privileged account of the login termination.