End User Software Management When Running as Normal Users on Windows
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So this is being discussed in a few thread and offline as well and the question arose... if people are not local admins in how they run on their desktops, and you don't want to heavily restrict software deployments, how can this be handled in a secure yet productive way.
I have some thoughts but as a non-Windows Admin, especially a non-desktop admin, I'm sure that a lot of people will have better insight than me. But I am familiar with a few good options.
- Allow Admin Escalation. If you have a user who is qualified, trusted and authorized to act as an admin (e.g. would be trusted with IT, but that is not their duties) then allowing escalation to admin would be okay. @Minion-Queen gets this. She isn't allowed to run as a local admin for using her computer, but she had an admin account so that if she wants to install something she does not have to go through IT to do it (but can, that's what IT is for.)
- Use a product like LANDesk. Using this you can a web page where users can click to install any pre-selected application. This is very smooth and way easier than a normal software installation. It does require prepping the applications, but it is a nice middle ground with application verification and really, really easy end user capabilities and can be used for ANY end user and can have approval workflow when necessary (manager approves license or whatever.)
- You can make something like LANDesk using Chocolatey (or other tools) that are locked to a private (or the public) repos and enable using that locally or through a custom interface. Lots of options.
- Have IT do it through scripts or GPO. Not as "all on the end user" but makes the system pretty easy and quick. Can be automated through a portal as well, bringing us back to #3.
- Just have a good ticket system and workflow for IT to do it. This is simpler than it sounds in most cases.
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As an outsourced IT Service Provider, we cannot be always available to clients to handle this need in as timely a fashion as needed at times (i.e. the owner says he needs his cat pics screensaver installed now).
The compromise we have come up with is a domain account that is added to the local administrators group in AD.
Then I created a PDF with instruction on how and when to use the account and emailed it to the department managers.
I also make use of this account to run an application the absolutely requires admin rights without the user knowing the password by using the runas command and saving the credentials into the Windows password store.
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This is the questions(s) I was trying to get to in my other thread.
I in NO WAY was trying to argue that running as a non-Admin is not the right way to do it, 100% of the time. (I sound like Ron Burgandy there.)
I was just asking if people left things on full lockdown all the time, or if there were instances (such as in a delay in response, as @JaredBusch mentions above or for off-hours) where you could loosen the restrictions a bit and still maintain the security we are looking for.
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@scottalanmiller said:
So this is being discussed in a few thread and offline as well and the question arose... if people are not local admins in how they run on their desktops, and you don't want to heavily restrict software deployments, how can this be handled in a secure yet productive way.
I have some thoughts but as a non-Windows Admin, especially a non-desktop admin, I'm sure that a lot of people will have better insight than me. But I am familiar with a few good options.
- Allow Admin Escalation. If you have a user who is qualified, trusted and authorized to act as an admin (e.g. would be trusted with IT, but that is not their duties) then allowing escalation to admin would be okay. @Minion-Queen gets this. She isn't allowed to run as a local admin for using her computer, but she had an admin account so that if she wants to install something she does not have to go through IT to do it (but can, that's what IT is for.)
- Use a product like LANDesk. Using this you can a web page where users can click to install any pre-selected application. This is very smooth and way easier than a normal software installation. It does require prepping the applications, but it is a nice middle ground with application verification and really, really easy end user capabilities and can be used for ANY end user and can have approval workflow when necessary (manager approves license or whatever.)
- You can make something like LANDesk using Chocolatey (or other tools) that are locked to a private (or the public) repos and enable using that locally or through a custom interface. Lots of options.
- Have IT do it through scripts or GPO. Not as "all on the end user" but makes the system pretty easy and quick. Can be automated through a portal as well, bringing us back to #3.
- Just have a good ticket system and workflow for IT to do it. This is simpler than it sounds in most cases.
I haven't met users that I can trust yet. They either install malware eventually, or worse, install bootlegs at will. 5 is probably the best option.
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The hardest question is "what security are you looking for."
We certainly have clients that demand that they have a person with this kind of access and literally most of our service calls and their cost is us cleaning up after they blow away storage, cripple servers, install malware (over and over again) and bring down production. But the customer continues to demand it, so we continue to make money fixing it.
But would we trust them or call them secure? No. It's better than nothing, but if the people cannot be trusted, it's still handing over the power to destroy everything. So it all depends on the people who are given the access and what level of security you seek.
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@marcinozga said:
I haven't met users that I can trust yet. They either install malware eventually, or worse, install bootlegs at will. 5 is probably the best option.
All of the options outside of #1 will prevent the malware (unless it sneaks past IT) and bootlegs.
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@JaredBusch said:
As an outsourced IT Service Provider, we cannot be always available to clients to handle this need in as timely a fashion as needed at times (i.e. the owner says he needs his cat pics screensaver installed now).
The compromise we have come up with is a domain account that is added to the local administrators group in AD.
I'm in the boat and also use group policy to push a local admin account to the machines through group policy. If a machine (esp laptops) decides it doesn't want to log in to the domain, you can just log in with the local account and get it going.
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Here is an idea, as well. Not great, but should work, right?
Make a script or tool (nothing fancy) that will get admin rights to install software BUT is locked to a specific folder or folders (network ones, presumably.) So you create a universal deployment point and make it universally mountable and read only. Then with this tool, any user is able to run an installer from that location directly, but only that location.
Does not handle middle of the night, ad hoc requests. But it does allow for a continuously growing repository of packages to install that is easily leveraged. And if you do need to do a middle of the night request you only need to get something downloaded to that location, nothing more.
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@Mike-Davis said:
@JaredBusch said:
As an outsourced IT Service Provider, we cannot be always available to clients to handle this need in as timely a fashion as needed at times (i.e. the owner says he needs his cat pics screensaver installed now).
The compromise we have come up with is a domain account that is added to the local administrators group in AD.
I'm in the boat and also use group policy to push a local admin account to the machines through group policy. If a machine (esp laptops) decides it doesn't want to log in to the domain, you can just log in with the local account and get it going.
Yeah, we push that LocalAdmin via GPO. It is not manually setup on the machines.
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@scottalanmiller said:
Here is an idea, as well. Not great, but should work, right?
Make a script or tool (nothing fancy) that will get admin rights to install software BUT is locked to a specific folder or folders (network ones, presumably.) So you create a universal deployment point and make it universally mountable and read only. Then with this tool, any user is able to run an installer from that location directly, but only that location.
Does not handle middle of the night, ad hoc requests. But it does allow for a continuously growing repository of packages to install that is easily leveraged. And if you do need to do a middle of the night request you only need to get something downloaded to that location, nothing more.
Setting up a Repo of sorts would be good for that... and a Web interface a la LanDesk or Chocolatey would be nice too... Limited only by the bandwidth of the device trying to connect and whether or not you require them to use VPN or ZT or something to access the repo when working remotely.
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@dafyre said:
@scottalanmiller said:
Here is an idea, as well. Not great, but should work, right?
Make a script or tool (nothing fancy) that will get admin rights to install software BUT is locked to a specific folder or folders (network ones, presumably.) So you create a universal deployment point and make it universally mountable and read only. Then with this tool, any user is able to run an installer from that location directly, but only that location.
Does not handle middle of the night, ad hoc requests. But it does allow for a continuously growing repository of packages to install that is easily leveraged. And if you do need to do a middle of the night request you only need to get something downloaded to that location, nothing more.
Setting up a Repo of sorts would be good for that... and a Web interface a la LanDesk or Chocolatey would be nice too... Limited only by the bandwidth of the device trying to connect and whether or not you require them to use VPN or ZT or something to access the repo when working remotely.
Right, and in theory this would lower bandwidth usage (for most businesses at least) while increasing install performance.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@dafyre said:
@scottalanmiller said:
Here is an idea, as well. Not great, but should work, right?
Make a script or tool (nothing fancy) that will get admin rights to install software BUT is locked to a specific folder or folders (network ones, presumably.) So you create a universal deployment point and make it universally mountable and read only. Then with this tool, any user is able to run an installer from that location directly, but only that location.
Does not handle middle of the night, ad hoc requests. But it does allow for a continuously growing repository of packages to install that is easily leveraged. And if you do need to do a middle of the night request you only need to get something downloaded to that location, nothing more.
Setting up a Repo of sorts would be good for that... and a Web interface a la LanDesk or Chocolatey would be nice too... Limited only by the bandwidth of the device trying to connect and whether or not you require them to use VPN or ZT or something to access the repo when working remotely.
Right, and in theory this would lower bandwidth usage (for most businesses at least) while increasing install performance.
This is why I asked months ago in the original chocolatey threads about setting up your own stuff for it.
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@scottalanmiller said:
Here is an idea, as well. Not great, but should work, right?
Make a script or tool (nothing fancy) that will get admin rights to install software BUT is locked to a specific folder or folders (network ones, presumably.) So you create a universal deployment point and make it universally mountable and read only. Then with this tool, any user is able to run an installer from that location directly, but only that location.
Does not handle middle of the night, ad hoc requests. But it does allow for a continuously growing repository of packages to install that is easily leveraged. And if you do need to do a middle of the night request you only need to get something downloaded to that location, nothing more.
While this might sound simple, I have no idea how you would kick it off? Ultimately I don't see how this could be much different than options 2 and 3. You create a script that uses the RunAs command with saved credentials as @JaredBusch mentioned, that launches a menu of the things in the repo directory that you can choose to install?
I can't think of another way (though I'm not a programmer, I don't even play one on TV) to have local admin rights run a script that a user couldn't tear apart and find the admin password inside that would be a network user that would somehow be limited to only have access to specific folders for the user to pick an installer there at random for them to install.
Not to mention it's really probably to much to ask them to install it anyway, so you'd need to build installer scripts so the users don't have to answer any questions for the install.
And we're right back at options 2 and 3 above.
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@Dashrender said:
@scottalanmiller said:
Here is an idea, as well. Not great, but should work, right?
Make a script or tool (nothing fancy) that will get admin rights to install software BUT is locked to a specific folder or folders (network ones, presumably.) So you create a universal deployment point and make it universally mountable and read only. Then with this tool, any user is able to run an installer from that location directly, but only that location.
Does not handle middle of the night, ad hoc requests. But it does allow for a continuously growing repository of packages to install that is easily leveraged. And if you do need to do a middle of the night request you only need to get something downloaded to that location, nothing more.
While this might sound simple, I have no idea how you would kick it off? Ultimately I don't see how this could be much different than options 2 and 3. You create a script that uses the RunAs command with saved credentials as @JaredBusch mentioned, that launches a menu of the things in the repo directory that you can choose to install?
I can't think of another way (though I'm not a programmer, I don't even play one on TV) to have local admin rights run a script that a user couldn't tear apart and find the admin password inside that would be a network user that would somehow be limited to only have access to specific folders for the user to pick an installer there at random for them to install.
Not to mention it's really probably to much to ask them to install it anyway, so you'd need to build installer scripts so the users don't have to answer any questions for the install.
And we're right back at options 2 and 3 above.
If you use powershell, it saves everything in an encrypted file, IIRC, so the user can't (easily) get at the admin username & Password.
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@Dashrender said:
Not to mention it's really probably to much to ask them to install it anyway, so you'd need to build installer scripts so the users don't have to answer any questions for the install.
IF $ABOVE=="True" THEN $isMoot
Basically, if this statement is true, then the issue is moot because they could not be installing software on their own and need IT anyway.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
Not to mention it's really probably to much to ask them to install it anyway, so you'd need to build installer scripts so the users don't have to answer any questions for the install.
IF $ABOVE=="True" THEN $isMoot
Basically, if this statement is true, then the issue is moot because they could not be installing software on their own and need IT anyway.
But that is the point of using a Repo-like install. Install the software, configured the way IT wants it. Then the user just has to click a link on the web site... we KNOW they are good at that, lol.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
Not to mention it's really probably to much to ask them to install it anyway, so you'd need to build installer scripts so the users don't have to answer any questions for the install.
IF $ABOVE=="True" THEN $isMoot
Basically, if this statement is true, then the issue is moot because they could not be installing software on their own and need IT anyway.
I'm not sure about your users, but my users would definitely ask on every dialog box - Heck, they call about the EULA for Adobe after an update is installed. I try to remember to launch it before I leave so I accept it and move on.
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@Dashrender said:
@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
Not to mention it's really probably to much to ask them to install it anyway, so you'd need to build installer scripts so the users don't have to answer any questions for the install.
IF $ABOVE=="True" THEN $isMoot
Basically, if this statement is true, then the issue is moot because they could not be installing software on their own and need IT anyway.
I'm not sure about your users, but my users would definitely ask on every dialog box - Heck, they call about the EULA for Adobe after an update is installed. I try to remember to launch it before I leave so I accept it and move on.
There's GPOs for that.
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As frequently as they are making updates for Flash, and Reader - I didn't bother digging into what it takes to do upgrades through software pushes.
Sure, there are GPOs for the EULA itself, but if I'm doing the install, it's not that big a deal to get rid of the EULA either.
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@JaredBusch said:
@Mike-Davis said:
@JaredBusch said:
As an outsourced IT Service Provider, we cannot be always available to clients to handle this need in as timely a fashion as needed at times (i.e. the owner says he needs his cat pics screensaver installed now).
The compromise we have come up with is a domain account that is added to the local administrators group in AD.
I'm in the boat and also use group policy to push a local admin account to the machines through group policy. If a machine (esp laptops) decides it doesn't want to log in to the domain, you can just log in with the local account and get it going.
Yeah, we push that LocalAdmin via GPO. It is not manually setup on the machines.
Consider changing this practice. I used to do it that way, too, but it's no longer considered secure and Microsoft won't even allow you to do it anymore in the newer versions of Windows Server in the GPPs.
Account info disseminated this way isn't hard to find, I believe its in the SYSVOL folder somewhere, and once an attacker had it they could laterally jump from machine to machine with ease. This would be especially bad if that policy was applied to more than just workstations.
This doesn't produce the exact same results, but today you would want to use Microsoft's LAPS (Local Administrator Password Solution):
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=46899
I've set it up several times now and it's really easy to use.I'm sorry if you're already familiar with it, but I didn't want anyone to think your suggestion is a good practice these days.
