Need some help.
I’ve been testing 1709 for the last week to prepare for a large deployment – and have run into a problem I can’t seem to solve on my own, nor can I find this exact problem and a solution with my normally excellent google-fu.
Some conditions: All users have passwords or PIN’s assigned and enforced. Multiple users are assigned/granted access to the same machine. Domain joined or stand-alone does not seem to matter – I’m seeing this behavior in both arrangements. Settings are enforced to require password at login. No auto-logins have been set, nor do any show up when audited. Fast boot is disabled. Hibernate is disabled.
Repro steps are fairly simple:
1) Log into user “A” with a password or preset PIN.
2) From the start menu: Reboot the machine. (Don’t log out first)
3) Log in on a different account – user “B” with their password or PIN.
Unwanted Result: When I open Task Manager, I’m seeing two users listed: the previous user and the current user! Previous user is shown as logged in but disconnected.
When you try to shutdown or reboot the machine in this state, you get a warning:
Work-around: (to get a clean boot) Log out every user first, then reboot or shutdown.
As far as I know this is a new bug in 1709 — very annoying in environments where multiple users are assigned to the same machine at different times of the day. It’s taking up resources and causing problems. Users are complaining when they reboot that there is an extra step. This also impacts application installs or uninstalls – warnings appear that another user is logged in. Worse, a reboot when a user is already on does not appear to properly clear memory state for that profile – a big can-o-worms if you’re dealing with an infection. Also interesting is that if I expand the disconnected user in Task Manager, I’m seeing all sorts of things running IN that profile that only happen on a live, running profile (OneDrive, Teams, AutoDesk Subscription Manager, anything set to auto-start at login.)
This MIGHT be an undocumented feature to speed up the login process for the last user (and it’s always the previous user before current user, not the same one every time) but it really bugs me that the previous user has NOT entered in their password.
Obviously I want to turn this off, but there’s no setting I can find that relates exactly. There’s the old panel to enforce using a password (netplwiz) and group policy for the same, and several registry hacks dating back forever – but most of those were either for accounts that did not have a password, or for auto-logins where you store a password for a specific user. And . . . they are all set properly already.
Anyone else seeing this? If so, were you able to turn it off? How?
~ Group "Weekend" ~
