AD-GPOREP-20: No GPOs should contain a default password
| ID | AD-GPOREP-20 |
| Severity | High |
| Suite | Active Directory (on-premises) |
| Product | Active Directory |
| Feature | Group Policy |
| Security area | Authentication |
| Resource type | GroupPolicy |
| User impact of fixing | Low |
| Effort to fix | Medium |
| Framework controls | nist-800-53-r5:IA-5(1) Authenticator Management | Password-based Authenticationnist-800-53-r5:SC-28 Protection of Information at Rest |
| MITRE ATT&CK | T1552.001, T1552.006 |
| Reads from | On-premises Active Directory |
What this checks and how to fix it
Section titled “What this checks and how to fix it”Test-MtAdGpoDefaultPasswordFoundDetails
Section titled “Test-MtAdGpoDefaultPasswordFoundDetails”Returns details of GPOs that contain a default password.
Why This Test Matters
Section titled “Why This Test Matters”- Detective control: verifies whether any GPO reports contain a default password and highlights those findings for remediation.
- In security terms, default passwords in GPOs are a common misconfiguration risk that attackers could exploit.
Control Type
Section titled “Control Type”Detective
Security Recommendation
Section titled “Security Recommendation”- Review GPOs listed in the report and replace default passwords with secure, unique credentials per policy. Remove any passwords that are no longer needed.
How the Test Works
Section titled “How the Test Works”- Invokes Get-MtADGpoState to fetch GPO state data, then filters GPO reports where DefaultPasswordFound is true.
- Builds a Markdown table of GPO name and the DefaultPasswordFound flag, plus a summary line with counts.
Related Tests
Section titled “Related Tests”Test-MtAdGpoDefaultPasswordFoundCount- Counts how many GPOs have a default password.
Related links
Section titled “Related links”Mito check. Author: soulemike. Open-source licences.
Open-source licences. CIS Benchmark material © Center for Internet Security, Inc.; CISA SCuBA baselines are public domain (CC0).
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