1.1.1.2.1.10 Set 'Devices: Prevent users from installing printer drivers' to 'Enabled'

Information

It is feasible for a attacker to disguise a Trojan horse program as a printer driver. The program may appear to users as if they must use it to print, but such a program could unleash malicious code on your computer network. To reduce the possibility of such an event, only administrators should be allowed to install printer drivers. However, because laptops are mobile devices, laptop users may occasionally need to install a printer driver from a remote source to continue their work. Therefore, this policy setting should be disabled for laptop users, but always enabled for desktop users. It may be appropriate in some organizations to allow users to install printer drivers on their own workstations. However, you should allow only Administrators, not users, to do so on servers, because printer driver installation on a server may unintentionally cause the computer to become less stable. A malicious user could install inappropriate printer drivers in a deliberate attempt to damage the computer, or a user might accidentally install malicious software that masquerades as a printer driver.

Solution

To implement the recommended configuration state, set the following Group Policy setting to 1.

Computer Configuration\Windows Settings\Security Settings\Local Policies\Security Options\Devices- Prevent users from installing printer drivers

Impact- Only users with Administrative, Power User, or Server Operator privileges will be able to install printers on the servers. If this policy setting is enabled but the driver for a network printer already exists on the local computer, users can still add the network printer.

See Also

https://workbench.cisecurity.org/files/42

Item Details

Category: ACCESS CONTROL

References: 800-53|AC-6(10), CCE|CCE-3769-7

Plugin: Windows

Control ID: 84917e25c6932662ad680ebd10e812344b9dd1c4f56c413577af06333b1558ff