220-802 · Question #528
The network administrator is called to assist a user, Joe, who has trouble accessing his network drive. Joe states he logs on with his credentials with no problem, however, when he attempts to…
The correct answer is C. Joe is logging in to the local user account. When a user can log in successfully but is prompted for credentials when accessing a UNC path, it means they logged into a local machine account whose credentials are unknown to the network resource.
Question
The network administrator is called to assist a user, Joe, who has trouble accessing his network drive. Joe states he logs on with his credentials with no problem, however, when he attempts to access a folder via UNC the system asks for credentials. Which of the following is the BEST explanation for this?
Options
- AJoe is logging in with a disabled network user name.
- BJoe does not have local share permission to access that folder.
- CJoe is logging in to the local user account.
- DJoe is not typing in the correct network password.
How the community answered
(40 responses)- A3% (1)
- B5% (2)
- C83% (33)
- D10% (4)
Why each option
When a user can log in successfully but is prompted for credentials when accessing a UNC path, it means they logged into a local machine account whose credentials are unknown to the network resource.
A disabled network account would prevent the initial login entirely, not allow login and then fail only on UNC access.
Share permissions affect what an authenticated user can do with the resource, but the symptom described is an authentication prompt, not an access-denied error after authentication.
Windows uses pass-through authentication for network resources - when a user is logged in with a domain account, their credentials are automatically passed to authenticate against network shares. If Joe is logged in with a local machine account instead of his domain account, the remote server does not recognize those credentials and must prompt separately for valid network credentials to grant access via UNC path.
If the network password were incorrect, the authentication failure would occur at initial login, not only when attempting to access the UNC path.
Concept tested: Local vs domain account authentication for UNC network paths
Source: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/security/windows-authentication/windows-authentication-overview
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