Vendor access to SFTP file path denied after change from Local Service to Windows Service Account

Question

I began running the Complete FTP Server under a Windows service account rather than the Local System account.  As a result, one of our vendors was not able to push files to our server.  The error message from the log is:  2021-03-10 02:53:26,937 DEBUG WindowsAdapter [Session.168:Default Site:FidelityProd:155.199.204.69] Exception thrown while complete-ftp was accessing 629_RMD_20210309.DAT - System.UnauthorizedAccessException:Access to the path 'C:\SFTP\Fidelity Prod\629_RMD_20210309.DAT' is denied.

This change only affected one vendor and not others.  

Any ideas why this would have happened?

Thanks,

Bob

Answer 1

CompleteFTP's configuration file contains sensitive information such as password hashes and certificates. Accordingly, some filesystem security restrictions are applied to this file (typically C:\ProgramData\Enterprise Distributed Technologies\Complete FTP\config.sdf), and the associated backup directory (C:\ProgramData\Enterprise Distributed Technologies\Complete FTP\backup). Access is configured for Administrators, the default account for the CompleteFTP service (the local SYSTEM user) and the installer.

Users who have changed the 'log on' user of the CompleteFTP service from the default (i.e. local SYSTEM user) may need to manually configure Windows file permissions after installation by giving full control of the configuration file and backup directory to the new log on user.