Microsoft's PrintNightmare update is causing a lot of problems with network printers
Dears, the latest Windows updates is causing a lot of problems with network printers mapped on a print server. Reference: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/kb5005652-manage-new-point-and-print-default-driver-installation-behavior-cve-2021-34481-873642bf-2634-49c5-a23b-6d8e9a302872 https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/managing-deployment-of-printer-rpc-binding-changes-for-cve-2021-1678-kb4599464-12a69652-30b9-3d61-d9f7-7201623a8b25 The two recent patches (KB5004945, KB5004760, or KB5003690) causes these two main problems: 1) unable for users without administrative rights to install new print drivers. The end user receive this error 2) unable to use the print server with the new registry key RpcAuthnLevelPrivacyEnabled **The system logs reports this error: 0x0000011b** The two workarounds that you have to apply to survive and allow corporate users to be able to use the print server are: 1) Even if you have a GPO with "Point and Print Restrictions=disabled", you have to apply this registry key to allow non administrative users to install the latest print drivers from the print server HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows NT\Printers\PointAndPrint RestrictDriverInstallationToAdministrators = 0 2) Apply this registry key to disable the new default settings related to the print spooler vulnerabilities HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Print RpcAuthnLevelPrivacyEnabled = 0 The above workarounds are only a temporary solution to survive and allow users to print. What is unclear to me is what should be the right way to manage these settings in a corporate environment without any end user interaction. So, if I want to be protected and apply the recent security fixes without asking the end users to do something, what should I do? Microsoft states that you need to set "RpcAuthnLevelPrivacyEnabled" to "1" on both Client and Print Server in order to be protected, but if you do this, you can't print. So, what should we do in a Corporate environment to be secure and print without any end user interaction about "driver installation" etc.? Thanks in advance
