![\"mapped](\"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/05\/mapped-drives-enablelinkedconnections.png\")
<\/p>\nWhen you attempt to access a mapped network drive from an elevated or admin Command Prompt or Task Scheduler (with the highest privileges), the mapped drive won’t be available. Attempting to use the mapped network drives causes the error The system cannot find the path specified (Error code: 0x80070003)<\/i><\/b>.<\/p>\n
Here are the screenshots from a computer running Windows 10.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
However, the mapped network drive is accessible from File Explorer and regular (non-elevated) Command Prompt.<\/p>\n
There is a registry-based solution that lets you use mapped drives from standard as well as elevated processes.<\/p>\n
(Go to the solution directly<\/a>)<\/p>\n When an administrator logs on to Windows Vista, the Local Security Authority (LSA) creates two access tokens. If LSA is notified that the user is a member of the Administrators group, LSA creates the second logon that has the administrator rights removed (filtered). This filtered access token is used to start the user’s desktop. Applications can use the full administrator access token if the administrator user clicks Allow in a User Account Control dialog box.<\/em><\/p>\n If a user is logged on to Windows Vista and if User Account Control is enabled, a program that uses the user’s filtered access token and a program that uses the user’s full administrator access token can run at the same time. Because LSA created the access tokens during two separate logon sessions, the access tokens contain separate logon IDs.<\/em><\/p>\n As the drive mappings created from File Explorer are from a standard user token, the drives are not seen from an elevated token (e.g., Administrator Command Prompt or Scheduled Tasks configured to run with the highest privileges.)<\/p>\n Another Microsoft article, KB3035277, titled Mapped drives are not available from an elevated prompt when UAC is configured to “Prompt for credentials”<\/a>, explains along with a solution that works in Windows Vista through Windows 11.<\/p>\n When UAC is enabled, the system creates two logon sessions at user logon. Both logon sessions are linked to one another. One session represents the user during an elevated session, and the other session where you run under least user rights.<\/em><\/p>\n When drive mappings are created, the system creates symbolic link objects (“DosDevices”) that associate the drive letters to the UNC paths. These objects are specific for a logon session and are not shared between logon sessions.<\/em><\/p>\n Note The EnableLinkedConnections registry entry forces the symbolic links to be written to both linked logon sessions that are created, when UAC is enabled.<\/em><\/p>\n And here is a helpful note from James Finnigan [MSFT].<\/p>\n The “EnableLinkedConnections” policy relies on the user being a member of the Administrators group and sharing across the boundary between non-elevated and elevated (which can lead to intentionally misdirected drive mappings by Malware). It is essentially a workaround for customers that are in the process of moving their users to standard user, but need to do so gradually and keep them as members of the Administrators group in the short-term.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n As explained earlier, you can fix the problem by creating the The After restarting Windows, the drives are accessible in regular and elevated processes\u2014i.e., processes running under the filtered access token and the full administrator access token.<\/p>\n You can automate the above setting by creating a .reg file<\/a> from the following contents.<\/p>\n If your Scheduled Tasks still fail to access the mapped network drives despite enabling the If the following UAC Policy setting is configured to Prompt for credentials<\/strong>, the scheduled tasks (running with the highest privileges) fail to access the mapped network drive.<\/p>\n Using the Security Policy Editor ( More instructions to configure the above security policy (along with an alternative registry-based solution) are available in the article UAC asks for a password even if logged in as administrator.<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n After resetting the above policy, restart Windows. Your mapped drives should be available for scheduled tasks configured to run with the highest privileges.<\/p>\n Important:<\/strong> However, when you’re running the task under a different<\/strong> user account or the \nMicrosoft articles KB937624 After you turn on UAC, programs may be unable to access some network locations<\/a>\u00a0and KB3035277 address this issue.<\/p>\nKB937624 states:<\/h4>\n
KB3035277 states:<\/h4>\n
<\/a>Resolution<\/h2>\n
EnableLinkedConnections<\/strong><\/code> DWORD (32-bit) value in the following registry key and setting its data to 1<\/code><\/strong>.<\/p>\nHKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Policies\\System<\/pre>\n
\n
regedit.exe<\/code>)<\/li>\nEnableLinkedConnections<\/code> and set its data to 1<\/code>.
\n![\"mapped](\"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/05\/mapped-drives-enablelinkedconnections-3.png\")
<\/li>\nEnableLinkedConnections<\/code> value enables Windows to share network connections between the filtered access token and the full administrator access token for a member of the Administrators group. It would be best if you restarted the computer after creating the registry value.<\/p>\n![\"mapped](\"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/05\/mapped-drives-enablelinkedconnections-2.png\")
<\/p>\nUsing a .REG file<\/h4>\n
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00\n\n[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Policies\\System]\n\"EnableLinkedConnections\"=dword:00000001<\/pre>\n
\nTask Scheduler still can’t access mapped drives?<\/h3>\n
EnableLinkedConnections<\/code> registry value, then you’ll need to check two things:<\/p>\n\n
User Account Control: Behaviour of the elevation prompt for administrators in Admin Approval Mode<\/pre>\n
![\"UAC](\"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/uac-asks-password-admin-1.png\")
<\/p>\nsecpol.msc<\/code>) or the Registry Editor, you’ll need to set the above policy to Prompt for Content<\/strong>\u00a0 or Prompt for Content for non-Windows binaries <\/strong>(which is the Windows default setting.)<\/p>\n![\"UAC](\"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/uac-asks-password-admin-2.png\")
<\/p>\nSYSTEM<\/code> (LocalSystem<\/a>) context, the mapped drives won’t be seen despite the EnableLinkedConnections<\/code> registry value. This is because the network drive mappings are per-user. That means you’ll need to map the drive again under that specific user account configured to run the scheduled task.<\/p>\n