Once Windows 10 Always On VPN has been deployed in production, it may be necessary at some point for administrators to deny access to individual users or computers. Commonly this occurs when an employee is terminated or leaves the company, or if a device is lost, stolen, or otherwise compromised. Typically, this means that user accounts and computer accounts in Active Directory are disabled, and any issued certificates are revoked. However, additional steps may be required to disconnect current VPN sessions or prevent future remote connections.

Certificate Revocation

When certificates are used for authentication, for example when a device tunnel is deployed, or a user tunnel is configured to use Extensible Authentication Protocol (EAP) with user certificate authentication, immediately revoking issued user and device certificates and publishing a new Certificate Revocation List (CRL) is recommended. However, this will not instantly prevent VPN access because revocation information is cached on the VPN and NPS servers, as well as any online responders. The process of flushing certificate revocation caches is challenging and time consuming as well.

Blocking Users

To immediately prevent users from accessing the VPN, a security group must be created in Active Directory that contains users that will be denied access. In addition, a Network Policy must be created on the Network Policy Server (NPS) that denies access to users belong to this security group.

NPS Configuration

Once the security group has been created, open the NPS management console (nps.msc) and perform the following steps.

1. Expand Policies.
2. Right-click Network Policies and choose New.
3. Enter a descriptive name for the policy in the Policy name field.
4. Select Remote Access Server (VPN-Dial up) from the Type of network access server drop-down list.
5. Click Next.
6. Click Add.
   1. Select User Groups.
   2. Click Add.
   3. Click Add Groups.
   4. Select the security group create for denied users.
   5. Click Ok twice.
7. Click Next.
8. Select Access denied.
9. Click Next four times and click Finish.

Once complete, move the deny access policy so that it is before the policy that allows VPN access.

Device Tunnel Considerations

Since device tunnel connections don’t use the NPS for authentication, blocking devices from establishing Always On VPN connections requires a different technique. Once again, revoking the computer certificate and publishing a new CRL is recommended, but isn’t immediately effective. To address this challenge, it is recommended that the computer certificate issued to the client be retrieved from the issuing CA and placed in the local computer’s Untrusted Certificates store on each VPN server, as shown here.

Note: The certificate must be imported on each VPN server in the organization.

Terminating Connections

Once the guidance above is put in to place, any user or device that is denied access will be unable to connect to the VPN. However, if a user or device is currently connected when these changes are implemented, additional steps must be taken to proactively terminate their existing session. When using Windows Server Routing and Remote Access Service (RRAS) as the VPN server, uUser sessions can be proactively terminated using RRAS management console or PowerShell.

GUI

To terminate an established Always On VPN connection, open the RRAS management console (rrasmgmt.msc), highlight Remote Access Clients, then right-click the client connection and choose Disconnect. Repeat the process for any additional connections established by the user or device.

PowerShell

Alternatively, Always On VPN connections can also be terminated programmatically using PowerShell. To identify currently connected users on a VPN server, open an elevated PowerShell command window and run the following command.

Get-RemoteAccessConnectionStatistics | Format-Table -AutoSize

Next, to disconnect a user tunnel, identify the User Principal Name (UPN) of the user to disconnect and include it in the following PowerShell command.

Disconnect-VpnUser -UserName “user@corp.example.net”

To disconnect a device tunnel, identify the Fully-Qualified Domain Name (FQDN) of the device to disconnect and include it in the following PowerShell command.

Disconnect-VpnUser -UserName “client1.corp.example.net”

Additional Information

Windows 10 Always On VPN Hands-On Training