Losing NTFS File Permissions

Question

We have one file that is causing us some problems with permissions on our file share server. The user is running Windows 10 1909 and Office 2016. When goes to save a particular Excel spreadsheet, it makes her the owner, and erases all permissions the file may have, even though inheritance is still enabled.

The only permissions she has on the file itself under normal circumstances are as follows:

Traverse folder / execute file
List Folder / read data
Read attributes
Read extended attributes
Create files /write data
Create folders /append data
Write attributes
Write extended attributes
Delete subfolders and files
Read permissions

She does NOT have permission to change permissions or take ownership, and yet that is exactly what happens every time she makes changes to the file and saves it. I've even checked her effect access to make sure there are not any weird conflicts, and the permissions are exactly as the should be.

Update (3/4/21): We are seeing this more and more, and so far, it has only affected Excel spreadsheets. That appears to be the only common factor. We are using on-prem Office as well, with a mixture of 2013, 2016, and 2019. But there appears to be no pattern other than it only affects excel spreadsheets.... so far.

The only workaround I have found is to just have the end-user completely rebuild their excel spreadsheet from scratching, saving it directly to the network share. I will fix the permissions on the bad file so they can copy data, and then rename the old file. Otherwise, no fix has been found since this was first reported in September

Answer 1

Hello @JerryPurvis,

Thank you for posting here.

We can see the description of the way that Excel saves files based on the following link.

Description of the way that Excel saves files
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/814068/description-of-the-way-that-excel-saves-files

Meanwhile, the user who last edit the excel file will be the file owner.

We should configure user permissions on this Excel's upper level folder directory instead of this Excel itself.

Hope the information above is helpful. If anything is unclear, please feel free to let us know.

Best Regards,
Daisy Zhou

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Answer 2

This does not solve the issue. The shared folder is already setup so that whatever is saved in the folder and sub-folders inherits the permissions set in the upper levels.

The file itself even retains the setting to inherit permissions, but it does not inherit ownership nor permissions. I first have to reset the owner, then I have to to reset inheritance just to get it to take the permissions. I've even forced inheritance to be applied from upper-level folders, and it still loses permissions and ownership rights.

Answer 3

It's only this file, and I've checked all the permissions. The file SHOULD be inheriting permissions from the folder it is residing in, and they are set correctly. It just happened again last night. When it happens, and I go to the folder above, and check the box that says "replace all child object permission entries with inheritable permission...." on that specific file, it tells me "access is denied". Then I have to go into the file itself, and manually change the owner back to the original owner, the I have to disable inheritance, and then enable inheritance to get it to pick the permissions back up" But even if I do it the other way AFTER changing owner, where I recheck the box "replace all child object permissions..." from the parent folder, it still eventually loses ALL permissions again.

UPDATE: I might add that even the user who is working in the file will literally lose all access WHILE they are working in the file. So when they go to save the file, it tells them they do not have permission, even though they are now the new owner for some reason.

Answer 4

I have already tried that suggestion removing the user and the group and re-adding them, to no avail. I tried making a copy of the file, still the same issue. Give me some time to try to create the new file from scratch and test that, as it's a xlsm file, and I will get back to you. I am seriously scratching my head at this one lol.

Answer 5

Still waiting to get the new XLSM file setup, but it probably won't be for a couple weeks at most.