PowerShell will not allow me to enable unencrypted connections, due to missing Network Connection Profiles

Steps to reproduce

1. Enable Hyper-V
2. Install Cisco VPN client
3. Install Proton VPN client
4. Enable Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL)
5. Install Wireshark with NPCAP virtual adapter

C:\Users\TrevorSullivan> Set-Item -Path WSMan:\localhost\Service\AllowUnencrypted -Value true
Set-Item: WinRM firewall exception will not work since one of the network connection types on this machine is set to Public. Change the network connection type to either Domain or Private and try again.
C:\Users\TrevorSullivan> Get-NetConnectionProfile

Name             : Andromeda
InterfaceAlias   : Wi-Fi
InterfaceIndex   : 3
NetworkCategory  : Private
IPv4Connectivity : Internet
IPv6Connectivity : NoTraffic

C:\Users\TrevorSullivan> Enter-PSSession -ComputerName localhost
Enter-PSSession: Connecting to remote server localhost failed with the following error message : Access is denied. For more information, see the about_Remote_Troubleshooting Help topic.

Obviously, the Enter-PSSession command fails with Access is denied. I traced this back to the AllowUnencrypted setting on the WinRM service.

As you can see from the screenshots, the “Network Category” field is straight up missing for all but one of my network connections. Also, there’s only one connection profile returned by Get-NetConnectionProfile, and it’s already set to Private.

How am I supposed to discover which of my network connections is being detected as public?

Expected behavior

• Network Category is set for all network connections
• Get-NetConnectionProfile shows me which of my networks is public
• PowerShell sets WinRM configuration to allow unencrypted, without throwing any error messages

Actual behavior

PowerShell indicates that one of my network connections is public, although as best I can tell, none of them are set that way. There’s a conflict between what’s being reported by PowerShell and what’s being reported by Windows 10.

Environment data

Name                           Value
----                           -----
PSVersion                      7.0.3
PSEdition                      Core
GitCommitId                    7.0.3
OS                             Microsoft Windows 10.0.19041
Platform                       Win32NT
PSCompatibleVersions           {1.0, 2.0, 3.0, 4.0…}
PSRemotingProtocolVersion      2.3
SerializationVersion           1.1.0.1
WSManStackVersion              3.0

[pcgeek86]

I was able to work around this problem by creating a self-signed certificate, and setting up an HTTPS listener for WinRM. That way, I don’t need to worry about enabling AllowUnencrypted.

Still, this should be considered a bug.

@SeeminglyScience good idea. I tried that code, and it seems to have set the category to private. However, PowerShell is still complaining. See below.

C:\Users\TrevorSullivan> $networks | % { $_.getcategory() }
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
C:\Users\TrevorSullivan> Set-Item -Path WSMan:\localhost\Service\AllowUnencrypted -Value true
Set-Item: WinRM firewall exception will not work since one of the network connection types on this machine is set to Public. Change the network connection type to either Domain or Private and try again.

[vexx32]

@SteveL-MSFT this might need to be passed along to the windows team responsible for this module; if their module is reporting incorrect information, it’ll make life difficult for folks trying to handle this kind of thing in any automated fashion.