Monday, December 25, 2017

Interacting with elevated windows from Chrome Remote Desktop

Under most circumstances, the assistant in a Chrome Remote Desktop connection cannot interact with windows from elevated programs. This is due to Windows's User Interface Privilege Isolation mechanism. This makes system configuration tasks difficult through Chrome Remote Desktop. I suspect disabling UAC would do it, but there is another workaround if the host would prefer not to do that. These steps apply to the host (nothing special needs to be done by the helper to initiate the session):
  1. Make sure Chrome is closed
  2. Launch Chrome Remote Desktop from the Start menu as administrator
  3. Connect as normal
  4. If necessary, Chrome can be reopened now
  5. Launch an elevated command prompt
  6. Accept the UAC dialog on the host machine
  7. Launch any necessary administrative tools from that command prompt
The helper cannot access the secure desktop, so any elevation prompts will render the session inoperable. Since child processes of elevated processes are also elevated, all elevation must be done by using that command prompt.

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