Question

I have a Powershell script to detect disk space on a network server that requires a user/password to access it.

I followed this: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/winserverpowershell/thread/440ab7ed-7727-4ff7-a34a-6e69e2dff251/

To get this code:

$password = get-content C:\creds.txt | convertto-securestring
$cred = new-object -typename System.Management.Automation.PSCredential -argumentlist "username",$password
Get-WmiObject -ErrorAction Stop Win32_LogicalDisk -ComputerName $deviceName -credential $cred -Filter "DeviceID='$darg'"

$deviceName and $darg are already correctly defined.

This works just fine when running the Powershell script manually. But when I set it up as a Windows schedule task, it fails thinking the user/pass is incorrect:

Get-WmiObject : Access is denied. (Exception from HRESULT: 0x80070005 (E_ACCESS
DENIED))

$disks = Get-WmiObject <<<< -ErrorAction Stop Win32_LogicalDisk -ComputerName $deviceName -credential $cred -Filter
“DeviceID=’$darg'”
+ CategoryInfo : NotSpecified: (:) [Get-WmiObject], Unauthorized AccessException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : System.UnauthorizedAccessException,Microsoft.PowerShell.Commands.GetWmiObjectCommand

Why is this? (The account is a local user on the remote server. I’ve tried entering the credentials on the Schedule interface but it doesn’t let me save it, saying invalid login; maybe due to being a local account) ServerName\LocalUser does not work in the Windows Schedule UI, still gives the incorrect login error.

Answer 1

Here is my comment, re-worded as an answer.

The convertto/from-securestring functions work on a per-user basis (if you don’t provide a specific key value). IOW, one user can’t read another user’s data.

This pre-existing SO question seems relevant. There is also relevant discussion at Powershellcommunity.org.