How to enable BitLocker on Windows Server 2012 R2

Thanks to the improvements of virtualization and storage technologies, it’s not difficult to clone a disk. A great advantage for disaster recovery, but also a potential risk for the security of your information.

Microsoft allows to encrypt the disks of a server with a feature named BitLocker. We are going to see how you can enable BitLocker on a physical or virtual server to protect your company from data theft.

Install the BitLocker Drive Encryption feature with the Add Roles and Features Wizard:

You need to restart the system after the installation:

How to enable BitLocker on a virtual machine (without TPM)

You need the Trusted Platform Module (TPM) in order to take advantage of BitLocker encryption. Virtual machines don’t have the TPM module so you need to follow these two steps BEFORE configuring BitLocker (BitLocker must be installed on the server).

Open the Local Group Policy Editor (gpedit.msc) and go to Computer Configuration/Administrative Templates/Windows Components/BitLocker Drive Encryption/Operating System Drives. Double-clickRequire additional authentication at startup:

Select Enable and check Allow BitLocker without a compatibile TPM:

After a restart, open the Control Panel, you’ll find the BitLocker configuration panel. Open it and clickTurn On BitLocker:

In this tutorial we used a VM, so a system without a TPM, and Windows aks us to configure an additional authentication at startup. We chose a password to protect the data, but we suggest to use a USB flash drive instead. With a flash drive you don’t have to enter the password at every server restart, just leave the USB drive plugged and you’ll be fine:

A recovery key can save you from big troubles. We printed it for security reasons:

Choose the encryption mode more suited for your disks:

Click Continue:

Restart the system:

At the next boot you’ll be “forced” to enter the password or plug the USB flash drive. After the Windows start BitLocker will begin the encryption process:

How to enable Roaming Profiles on Windows Server 2012 R2

Roaming Profiles allow users of an Active Directory Domain to access their desktop and documents from any PC of the domain.

It’s a powerful feature that can improve the productivity of the employees and make their lives easier.

The best thing about Roaming Profiles is how they are easy to set up.

Before configuring a Roaming Profile, we need to create a Share. Open the Server Manager and go to the Shares tab:

Create a new Share:

Click Next:

Specify the path of the Roaming Profiles. Add a $ to the end of the path to make the shared folder invisible:

Click Next:

Enable access-based Enumeration (for better security):

Now it’s time to customize the permissions. We need to allow the access to Domain Users (or another Group). Click Customize permissions:

Click Add:

Select the group (Domain Users in our example) and apply the permissions to This folder only. You need to enable List folders / read data and Create folders / append data:

Confirm and the share will be created:

Now the final step. Open the Active Directory Users and Computers panel:

Open the Properties of a user and go to the Profile tab. Specify the Profile Path:\\server_name\profile_folder_name\%username%

Mission accomplished! Your first Roaming Profile is enabled and active. To create other Roaming Profiles use the copy functionalities or manually specify the Profile Path.

You can also create a policy to automate the process.

How to: Software Restriction policies with AppLocker

We’ve already seen how to restrict software on Windows Server 2012 // R2 using GPOs. There’s another way available since Windows Server 2012, thanks to a feature called AppLocker.

We still use GPOs – AppLocker is a subset of GPOs – to enforce software restriction but it’s easier and more powerful.

AppLocker can manage execution permissions of:

• Executables: files with .exe extension
• Windows installers: Windows installer packages with .msi and .msp extensions
• Scripts: files with .ps1, .bat, .cmd, .cbs and .js extensions
• Packaged Apps: Windows Store apps

Open the Server Manager and launch the Group Policy Management:

Create a new GPO:

Edit the policy:

You will find the AppLocker settings inside the path Computer Configuration\Policies\Windows Settings\Security Settings\Application Control Policies\AppLocker. Click Configure rule enforcement:

Check all the rules if you want to enforce them. By default AppLocker blocks all executables, installer packages and scripts, except for those specified in Allow rules:

AppLocker differs from software restriction policies for the ability to automatically create rules. Right-click in the white box and select Automatically Generate Rules, a wizard will appear:

Specify the users that will be affected and select the path that will be analyzed to automatically create “Allow execute” rules:

You can choose to allow or not-allow the execution of unsigned executables. It’s better to create the rules based on the executable hash rather than the file path, it’s more reliable:

Click Create:

The new rules will appear:

We can also manually create other rules. Right-click on the background and choose Create New Rule:

Click Next:

Specify the users who will be affected by the rule and the rule type (Allow or Deny execution):

There are three ways to specify which applications will be affected by the rule:

• Publisher: identify the applications signed by a specific publisher;
• Path: identify specific files and paths;
• File Hash: identifiy applications based on their digital fingerprint.

In our example we chose Path:

Specify the Path:

You can add exceptions if you need them:

Name your new rule and click Create:

The rule will appear: