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When I run a Powershell script using an encrypted password:

$PasswordEncrypted = Get-Content "C:\SecureFolder\FileWithPasswordEncrypted.txt" | ConvertTo-SecureString

I get this error:

ConvertTo-SecureString: Error occurred during a cryptographic operation.

What am I doing wrong?

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In this particular case, I am trying to read a secured string from a file made by another user. When such a file with a password is prepared without the –Key or –SecureKey parameters of ConvertTo-SecureString, only the same user account on the same computer will be able to use this encrypted string.

Source: https://www.pdq.com/blog/secure-password-with-powershell-encrypting-credentials-part-1/#convertto-securestring-encrypting-passwords-and-other-strings

A similar topic: ConvertTo-SecureString run without key on different user account, is there a way (with proper credentials) to get this working from a different user?

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4 Comments

"I am trying to read a secured string from a file made by another user" sounds like something you should include in the question :)
Fyi: if you omit the Key argument for the ConvertTo-SecureString cmdlets, the encryption will be based on the Data Protection API (DPAPI). Also note that DPAPI is only available on Windows systems.
@MathiasR.Jessen, a little bit of narration ;-) But to be more serious, I didn't know about it earlier, so the story in question is for real.
@iRon, you are right! Although I sometimes use non-Windows OSes, here I forget about the Windows context. Vote up for you, guys!

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