1. cell in prison or room in a mental institution with padded surfaces in which violent prisoners or patients are confined without risk of injuring themselves. padded cellwhere you put lusers so they can't hurt anything. a program that limits a luser to a carefully restricted subset of the capabilities of the host system (for example, the rsh utility on usg unix). note that this is different from an iron box because it is overt and not aimed at enforcing security so much as protecting others (and the luser) from the consequences of the luser's boundless naivet'e (see: naive). also padded cell environment