PKI: Active Directory Web Service (ADWS) logs Event ID 1400 after changing DC certificate from “Domain Controller” template to “Kerberos Authentication” template.

Microsoft recommends using “Kerberos Authentication” template for Domain Controllers instead of older “Domain Controller” and “Domain Controller Authentication” templates https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/security/identity-protection/hello-for-business/hello-hybrid-cert-whfb-settings-pki

we can easily do so creating a duplicate of “Kerberos Authentication” template and set up a superseding for templates issued based on older templates.

One of my Customers complained that when he did so, Active Directory Web Services (used, for example for remote Power Shell connect) started to log a Warning (Even Id 1400), regardless the fact the certificate has proper EKU and the server FQDN is included in subject name (as DNS name as it is described in the article) and in SAN.

Event Id: 1400

Active Directory Web Services could not find a server certificate with the specified certificate name. A certificate is required to use SSL/TLS connections. To use SSL/TLS connections, verify that a valid server authentication certificate from a trusted Certificate Authority (CA) is installed on the machine. Certificate name:

It is important to note that by default “Kerberos Authentication” template has Subject name set to None as per RFC 3280, so he customized the template duplicate and put “DNS name” under “Subject name format”.

Resolution:

I created a new duplicate of the Kerberos Authentication template (Server 2003 Compatibility level!!!) and add a Common Name to the Subject Name field

after that I added the template to my CA and requested the template-based certificate from my Domain Controller. I removed the old certificatee to keep just one certificate in the Local machine store.

After after restart ADWS successfully recognized the certificate (Even Id 1401).

Note: Microsoft has an article saying the empty Subject name is fine from RFC point of view, but that can cause issues with third-party apps… It looks like not only with third party

Intune: RemoteWipe fails to execute on Windows 10 client with "The request is not supported"

Another surprise from Intune – I tried to Wipe a Win 10 Client remotely from Intune Console and it failed with abovementioned error on the Client.

There are a couple of articles related to what can cause that

https://support.microsoft.com/en-hk/help/4034985/intune-remotewipe-fails-to-execute-on-windows-10-client-with-the-reque

and

https://support.microsoft.com/en-ca/help/4039769/remotewipecommandfailstoexecuteonwindows10clientwiththerequestisnotsup

but my case was not documented – I had an encrypted data drive connected to my test VM. (I tested Bitlocker on data drives). As soon as I removed the drive and refreshed the policy the device was wiped.

I am wondering what if I will have the situation in prod and the drive removal is not an option?????

Interesting enough that FreshStart AKA CompleteWipe works just fine….

Intune: Remove Microsoft Teams shortcut

I am in the middle of Windows Autopilot project. The Customer wants Microsoft Teams be a part of an Application set we install.

We are also implementing One Drive Known folder Move  (KFM) to redirect desktop to One Drive for Business.

The problem is related to Teams behaviour – it installs its shortcut on a user desktop every time it is installed. As a result we do have multiple Teams shortcuts after each device wipe – Teams creates a shortcut and after that another shortcut is synchronized by KFM from One Drive.

I spent a while, trying to find a solution to disable Teams shortcut creation; but it looks like at that time Microsoft does not provide any policy/registry settings to prohibit that.

So, I decided to delete the excessive shortcut using PowerShell script.   The problem with that is Intune behaviour – it runs a script only once . From my experience KFM kicks on quite a while after the user logon, so PowerShell script being added to the process will just miss it.

After all I decided to create a Win32 application in Intune and set up a detection rule to be sure the App will run (and re-run) when it is required.

Here is the removeshortcut.ps1 script to delete the excessive shortcuts

$DesktopPath = [Environment]::GetFolderPath(“Desktop”) remove-item -path $DesktopPath\* -filter “Microsoft Teams (*.lnk”

Here is install.cmd acting as “Install” in win32 app

powershell.exe -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -command “& ‘.\removeshortcut.ps1′”

Here is detection.ps1 script for win32 application

$DesktopPath = [Environment]::GetFolderPath(“Desktop”) if (-Not (Test-Path -Path “$desktoppath\Microsoft Teams (*.lnk”)) {write-host “missing”}

After that I packaged the “application” using IntuneWinAppUtil.exe tool and created a Win32 Application in Intune (it must be run in User context) and assigned it to a group of Users.

On the first run it successfully removed the shortcuts. I put them back to see when Intune realizes the “application” is not installed and run the command again . Unfortunately, according MS dock re-evaluation will happen in 24 hours…    https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/intune/apps-add

Intune: Configure Intune NDES Connector to get User certificates from Digicert (Symantec) Web Services

One of my Customers moving everything to Azure decided to replace internal Microsoft PKI with a managed solution from Digicert (Digicert bought Symantec certificate business recently).

At the present time Microsoft has an article describing Intune Configuration with Symantec PKI Manager Web Service: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/intune/certificates-symantec-configure

Unfortunately, it is not very clear what needs to be configured on Symantec (sorry, Digicert) side and I spent some time to get it working.

So, first of you need to talk to Digicert and get a Managed PKI environment.

After that, as per the article, generate a managed certificate and deploy your Managed PKI environment Root cert using Intune. It should be easy.

I took this certificate:

After that you need to add  a certificate profile on Symantec side (MS article does not provide any details on it):

I select Client Authentication (User)

Give your template a friendly name, select a PKI Web Services as Enrollment method and click Advanced Options:

Now we need to do an interesting trick. It is in “Troubleshooting” section of Microsoft article and apparently is required if your UPN have a special characters. I need it even though my UPN did not have them… So:

– Click Add field and select Common Name (CN) and Webservice Request. That will create a new Common Name tab at the bottom. DO NOT click Save

– Delete the old Common Name (CN) at the top of the list.

– You can customize other parameters. For example, I added an email as a Subject Alternative Name

– Now you can save

Copy Certificate Template OID, you will need it for Intune:

At this point you can Download/Install Intune Connector. The procedure is described well in the Microsoft article.

When the connector is up:

you can create an Intune PKSC 10 profile (I also added EKU even though it is not in the doc):

Save the settings, click Create the profile and assign it to a group of users.

After Intune policy update the certificate should be requested by Intune on a Client behalf and deployed to your device:

SCCM: CMG Provisioning Failed

Microsoft published an interesting Lab Set for Modern Desktop Management. Between projects I decided to install the kit and try Labs.

Here are some gotchas:

1. If Azure Account does not have an Azure Subscription in its own directory CMG installer cannot see the Subscription. Even if the account has rights to another subscription. I needed to create a new rial subscription linked to the same AAD to be able to proceed.

2. Even after that CMG provisioning failed. I checked the logs and found that Microsoft decided to not register Classic Compute (yes, CMG still uses Classic model). TO fix that I ran Powershell in Azure Portal and register requred provider:

register-azurermresourceprovider –providernamespace “Microsoft.ClassicCompute”

will see what additional surprises MS prepared…

SCCM: Client-Server traffic estimation

Found an interesting capacity test from SaudM. Can help to answer a Customer network team questions: https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/manageabilityguys/2013/04/22/system-center-2012-configuration-manager-client-network-traffic-estimates-series-part-1-of-3/

SCCM: Server OS Upgrade on site server

Today I decided to test OS Upgrade on my SCCM 1810 site server. I never recommend it to my Customers preferring side-by-side as a cleaner solution, but since Microsoft listed it as a viable option I decided to see what will be an experience.

Original state: Windows Server 2012 R2 + SQL 2014 + SCCM 1810 with rollup and two updates

Target: Windows Server 2019 + SQL 2017 CU13 + SCCM 1810 with rollup and two updates

1. I started with SQL Upgrade

– SQL 2017 does not have reporting services, it should be installed separately. So, I guess ideally it make sense to backup database and recovery key for SSRS. Bot since I did not have any custom reports I decided just re-install SSRS. Note: SQL 2017 will uninstall SSRS, but leave its databases.

– SQL 2017 does not have SQL Management Studio, it should be installed separately. So I guess it make sense to uninstall SSMS before the upgrade. I did not do it, just installed the latest standalone SSMS on top, but I think it would be cleaner to uninstall the old one first.

– When I installed fresh SSMS the first time it miserably failed. I rebooted the machine and run installer again, at that time it finished successfully. 

– Since I did not delete SSRS databases and I did not bother backup recovery key I needed to create a new Reporting database with different name.

2. OS Upgrade.

– Check if there is any pending reboot

– Even though I did not have any my first upgrade failed. I rebooted the server and started again and this time OS upgraded successfully.

3. SCCM on new OS

– When I tried t start SCCM Console the connection to SCCM failed. I suspected some permission malfunctioning so I Reset the site using cd.latest folder. That did not help

– I found an forum post by Gordon Fecyk https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/e1302081-fae4-4685-87ac-518636a14a24/permission-problems-after-os-upgrade-on-sccm-site-server?forum=ConfigMgrCBGeneral and checked WMI rights on my upgraded server – SMS\Site_Code was ok, but \SMS itself missed some permissions for SMS Admins group. I set the permissions as per the post and the Console connects to SCCM successfully.

– Software Update Point is down (in Server Console WSUS requires additional configuration. I fixed it using:

“%PROGRAMFILES%\Update Services\Tools\wsusutil.exe” postinstall CONTENT_DIR=f:\WSUS SQL_INSTANCE_NAME=”localhost”

– Reporting Point is down too – fixed by resetting reporting service access account (in properties of Reporting Service Point in SCCM Console).

Will see how SCCM will work now

Still prefer side-by-side…

Azure: Deploy One Drive Known Folder Move with Intune

I am preparing for an Autopilot project for one of my Customers. Microsoft recommends to use One Drive for Business for User data migration.

I tried a couple off approaches how it can be achieved with Intune:

1. Using OMA-DM as per Deploy OneDrive KFM with Microsoft Intune OMA-URI

2. Using Powershell Management Extension: How to deploy OneDrive Known Folder Move with Intune

Both approaches are working; personally I prefer OMA-DM hoping Microsoft will add this option to a standard profile options.

SCCM: Best Practice Tips and Tricks from systemcenterdudes

https://www.systemcenterdudes.com/sccm-best-practices/

Windows 10: Install RSAT

With 1803 MS includes RSAT into W10 Image as an optional feature. On Enterprise Edition it should be installed with Powershell as described here: http://woshub.com/install-rsat-feature-windows-10-powershell/