How To Determine Whether a Thread Is Running in User Context of Local Administrator Account

MORE INFORMATION

By default, the token that is associated with a thread is that of its containing process. This "user context" is superceded by any token that is attached directly to the thread. Therefore, to determine a thread's user context, you should first attempt to obtain a token for the thread with the OpenThreadToken function. If this method fails and the GetLastError function reports ERROR_NO_TOKEN, then you can obtain the token for the process with the OpenProcessToken function.

After you obtain the token of the current user, you can use the AccessCheck function to detect whether the user is an administrator. To do this, follow these steps:

1. Create a security identifier (SID) for the local administrator group by using the AllocateAndInitializeSid function.
2. Construct a new security descriptor (SD) with a Discretionary Access Control List (DACL) that contains an Access Control Entry (ACE) for the administrator group's SID.
3. Call AccessCheck with the token of the current user and the newly constructed SD to detect whether the user is an administrator.

The following sample code uses the functions that are mentioned earlier in this article to test whether the current thread is running as a user who is an administrator on the local computer.

Sample code

#include <windows.h>
#include <stdio.h>
#include <lmcons.h>


BOOL IsCurrentUserLocalAdministrator(void);


void main(int argc, char **argv)
{
   if (IsCurrentUserLocalAdministrator())
      printf("You are an administrator\n");
   else
      printf("You are not an administrator\n");
}



/*-------------------------------------------------------------------------

-
IsCurrentUserLocalAdministrator ()

This function checks the token of the calling thread to see if the caller
belongs to the Administrators group.

Return Value:
   TRUE if the caller is an administrator on the local machine.
   Otherwise, FALSE.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------*

/
BOOL IsCurrentUserLocalAdministrator(void)
{
   BOOL   fReturn         = FALSE;
   DWORD  dwStatus;
   DWORD  dwAccessMask;
   DWORD  dwAccessDesired;
   DWORD  dwACLSize;
   DWORD  dwStructureSize = sizeof(PRIVILEGE_SET);
   PACL   pACL            = NULL;
   PSID   psidAdmin       = NULL;

   HANDLE hToken              = NULL;
   HANDLE hImpersonationToken = NULL;

   PRIVILEGE_SET   ps;
   GENERIC_MAPPING GenericMapping;

   PSECURITY_DESCRIPTOR     psdAdmin           = NULL;
   SID_IDENTIFIER_AUTHORITY SystemSidAuthority = SECURITY_NT_AUTHORITY;


   /*
      Determine if the current thread is running as a user that is a member 

of
      the local admins group.  To do this, create a security descriptor 

that
      has a DACL which has an ACE that allows only local aministrators 

access.
      Then, call AccessCheck with the current thread's token and the 

security
      descriptor.  It will say whether the user could access an object if 

it
      had that security descriptor.  Note: you do not need to actually 

create
      the object.  Just checking access against the security descriptor 

alone
      will be sufficient.
   */
   const DWORD ACCESS_READ  = 1;
   const DWORD ACCESS_WRITE = 2;


   __try
   {

      /*
         AccessCheck() requires an impersonation token.  We first get a 

primary
         token and then create a duplicate impersonation token.  The
         impersonation token is not actually assigned to the thread, but is
         used in the call to AccessCheck.  Thus, this function itself never
         impersonates, but does use the identity of the thread.  If the 

thread
         was impersonating already, this function uses that impersonation 

context.
      */
      if (!OpenThreadToken(GetCurrentThread(), TOKEN_DUPLICATE|TOKEN_QUERY, 

TRUE, &hToken))
      {
         if (GetLastError() != ERROR_NO_TOKEN)
            __leave;

         if (!OpenProcessToken(GetCurrentProcess(), 

TOKEN_DUPLICATE|TOKEN_QUERY, &hToken))
            __leave;
      }

      if (!DuplicateToken (hToken, SecurityImpersonation, 

&hImpersonationToken))
          __leave;


      /*
        Create the binary representation of the well-known SID that
        represents the local administrators group.  Then create the 

security
        descriptor and DACL with an ACE that allows only local admins 

access.
        After that, perform the access check.  This will determine whether
        the current user is a local admin.
      */
      if (!AllocateAndInitializeSid(&SystemSidAuthority, 2,
                                    SECURITY_BUILTIN_DOMAIN_RID,
                                    DOMAIN_ALIAS_RID_ADMINS,
                                    0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, &psidAdmin))
         __leave;

      psdAdmin = LocalAlloc(LPTR, SECURITY_DESCRIPTOR_MIN_LENGTH);
      if (psdAdmin == NULL)
         __leave;

      if (!InitializeSecurityDescriptor(psdAdmin, 

SECURITY_DESCRIPTOR_REVISION))
         __leave;

      // Compute size needed for the ACL.
      dwACLSize = sizeof(ACL) + sizeof(ACCESS_ALLOWED_ACE) +
                  GetLengthSid(psidAdmin) - sizeof(DWORD);

      pACL = (PACL)LocalAlloc(LPTR, dwACLSize);
      if (pACL == NULL)
         __leave;

      if (!InitializeAcl(pACL, dwACLSize, ACL_REVISION2))
         __leave;

      dwAccessMask= ACCESS_READ | ACCESS_WRITE;

      if (!AddAccessAllowedAce(pACL, ACL_REVISION2, dwAccessMask, 

psidAdmin))
         __leave;

      if (!SetSecurityDescriptorDacl(psdAdmin, TRUE, pACL, FALSE))
         __leave;

      /*
         AccessCheck validates a security descriptor somewhat; set the 

group
         and owner so that enough of the security descriptor is filled out 

to
         make AccessCheck happy.
      */
      SetSecurityDescriptorGroup(psdAdmin, psidAdmin, FALSE);
      SetSecurityDescriptorOwner(psdAdmin, psidAdmin, FALSE);

      if (!IsValidSecurityDescriptor(psdAdmin))
         __leave;

      dwAccessDesired = ACCESS_READ;

      /*
         Initialize GenericMapping structure even though you
         do not use generic rights.
      */
      GenericMapping.GenericRead    = ACCESS_READ;
      GenericMapping.GenericWrite   = ACCESS_WRITE;
      GenericMapping.GenericExecute = 0;
      GenericMapping.GenericAll     = ACCESS_READ | ACCESS_WRITE;

      if (!AccessCheck(psdAdmin, hImpersonationToken, dwAccessDesired,
                       &GenericMapping, &ps, &dwStructureSize, &dwStatus,
                       &fReturn))
      {
         fReturn = FALSE;
         __leave;
      }
   }
   __finally
   {
      // Clean up.
      if (pACL) LocalFree(pACL);
      if (psdAdmin) LocalFree(psdAdmin);
      if (psidAdmin) FreeSid(psidAdmin);
      if (hImpersonationToken) CloseHandle (hImpersonationToken);
      if (hToken) CloseHandle (hToken);
   }

   return fReturn;
}