Advice on removing a start-up password

[Bill Stanley]

Hi,

I know that this is not a Windows support forum but most of it relates 
to using a Linux script, so bear with me if possible.

I am trying to help a friend that fell prey to a phone scam involving 
her Windows XP computer.  To make it a short story, she allowed the 
scammer to remotely access her computer and he enabled the Syskey 
startup password that Microsoft puts an every Windows machine.  The 
startup password is only for high security computers and it prevents a 
user from booting the computer unless a password is entered.  Now the 
scammer is holding her computer and data hostage.  A link to a pertinent 
webpage that describes the problem exactly is as follows...

http://computernetworkingnotes.com/xp-tips-and-trick/remove-administrator-password.html 


Enter my part in the mess...  My friend contacted me for help and I 
enjoy a challenge.  I found a possible fix which involves  creating a 
boot disk, booting to a simple version of linux and running alinux 
script.  It seems a bit dodgy to me and I want to know what others on 
the forum think of this.  Of course, I have not done this yet.  I plan 
to backup her data first using Lunbuntu to get in.  While I have access 
using Lunbuntu, can I do the fix directly and not have to rely on an 
unknown boot disk which might make matters worse.