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I hope I'm at the right place (right stack exchange website). If not please tell me the right one.

I got new rights on a folder on a Windows server by being added to Active Directory Group for which I didn't had access.

But although I had rights, I was not able to access the folder. I had to logout/login in order for me to have access.

Why so? If it is the server that authorize me according to who I am, then why rebooting my machine (or logoff/login) is required to have access to that folder?

What is the minimum action to do to have access to that folder? Do we absolutely have to logoff/login ?

Eric Ouellet
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3 Answers3

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A old text, but please see How Security Groups are Used in Access Control as it explain the process. The token is refreshed when your logoff/login happen

When a user or group is given permission to access a resource, such as a printer or a file share, the SID of the user or group is added to the access control entry (ACE) defining the granted permission in the resource's discretionary access control list (DACL). In Active Directory Domain Services, each object has an nTSecurityDescriptor attribute that stores a DACL defining the access to that particular object or attributes on that object. For more information about setting access control on objects in Active Directory Domain Services, see Controlling Access to Objects in Active Directory Domain Services.

When a user logs on to a Windows 2000 domain, the operating system generates an access token. This access token is used to determine which resources the user may access. The user access token includes the following data:

User SID.

SIDs of all global and universal security groups that the user is a member of.

SIDs of all nested global and universal security groups.

Every process executed on behalf of this user has a copy of this access token.

When the user attempts to access resources on a computer, the service through which the user accesses the resource will impersonate the user by creating a new access token based on the access token created at user logon time. This new access token will also contain the following SIDs:

SIDs for all domain local groups in the target domain that the user is a member of. SIDs for all machine local groups on the target computer that the user is a member of. The service uses this new access token to evaluate access to the resource. If a SID in the access token appears in any ACEs in the DACL, the service gives the user the permissions specified in those ACEs.

yagmoth555
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But although I had rights, I was not able to access the folder. I had to logout/login in order for me to have access.

That is the expected behavior.

What is the minimum action to do to have access to that folder? Do we absolutely have to logoff/login?

AFAIK, yes.

joeqwerty
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    Although your answer is exactly what I expected, I chosen yagmoth555 answer because it give me more information on the reason why and help me better understand the mechanism. But thank you very much. Thumbs up! – Eric Ouellet Sep 25 '18 at 20:23
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    Glad to help... – joeqwerty Sep 25 '18 at 20:33
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Just as additional information...

From Perphenazine at ars technica

Depends on what you mean by 'permissions'. Do you mean NTFS permissions? If so, they do take effect immediately. Do you mean permissions against an AD object? That requires a replication interval (a few minutes). Do you mean you changed group membership? That always requires a logoff/logon as group membership is appended to the kerberos ticket received at authentication.

Eric Ouellet
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