Microsoft's PrintNightmare fix breaks corporate printing

Whoever dubbed the printer-driver related privilege escalation bug PrintNightmare was very prescient, as it seems Microsoft’s troubles related to the exploit are never-ending.

Microsoft rolled out a patch for the issue in this month’s Patch Tuesday, and the company has now confirmed that the patch does break network printing in some circumstances.

Those affected by the bug will find their PC requesting Administrator credentials every time apps attempt to print.

Microsoft writes:

Error Description
After installing KB5005033 or a later update, certain printers in some environments using Point and Print may display a “Trust this printer” prompt and require administrator credentials to install when an application tries to access print to a print server or a print client connects to a print server. This is caused by a printer driver using the same file name on the print client and the print server, but the server has a newer version of the file. When the print client connects to the print server, it finds a newer driver file and is prompted to update the drivers on the print client, but the file in the package

Workaround: Make sure that you are using the latest drivers for all of your printing devices and, if possible, use the same version of the printer driver on the print client and the print server.

Solution: This problem is fixed externally by adjusting the printer drivers in your environment. If updating the drivers in your environment does not solve the problem, please contact the support of your printer manufacturer (OEM). For more information, see Q1 / A1 in the Frequently Asked Questions section of KB5005652.

Microsoft refers users to their printer company for a fix, but I suspect those affected will likely be in some chaos for some time.

via Winfuture