How to Enable Remote Administration in Windows Safely and Repeatably

MSPs require a secure baseline for remote management that can be easily applied across Windows endpoints and servers. However, it is necessary to enable services accompanied by scoping and hardening to avoid unnecessary risk. To implement a safe configuration, you will need the correct transport, scoped firewall rules, least privilege group assignments, and verifiable logging.

This guide provides your MSP and IT team with a concrete guide to enable Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP), Windows Remote Management (WinRM), and Remote Assistance. The steps provided are auditable, controlled, and excellent for deployment at scale.

Steps to enable remote administration in Windows safely

Before you start enabling remote administration in Windows, you will need to implement the following baseline requirements:

📌 Prerequisites:

• You need to have already created an admin group for Remote Desktop Users or local administrators.
• IT teams must restrict remote access to management subnets or designated jump hosts using firewall rules.
• Trusted certificates must be configured for WinRM HTTPS listeners on all managed endpoints.
• You will need to forward sign-in and remote session events to a centralized log collector or to a Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) tool.

Step 1: Choose transports and enable RDP securely

📌 Use Cases:

• This step ensures that you can perform remote administration without exposing systems broadly, providing controlled and secure access.
• It allows you to troubleshoot, automate, or assist users remotely while enforcing authentication.

📌 Prerequisites:

• You will need administrative rights on the system to enable RDP and configure firewall rules.
• This requires access to System Properties, Windows Firewall settings, or Group Policy Management Console.

Process:

1. First, you need to decide which transport to use:
   1. RDP for interactive troubleshooting
   2.  WinRM for scripted management
   3. Remote Assistance for guided sessions
2. Once you’ve picked your transport, open System Properties > Remote and select Allow Remote Connections.
3. Next, require Network Level Authentication (NLA) for all RDP sessions.
4. Add only trusted accounts to the Remote Desktop Users group.
5. Enable the built-in Remote Desktop firewall rules on Windows Defender Firewall with Advanced Security.
6. Scope firewall rules to trusted admin subnets or jump hosts.

Step 2: Enable WinRM for secure remote management

📌 Use Cases:

• Enables secure, script-based remote management using PowerShell.
• Reduces reliance on RDP by allowing automation and configuration without full desktop access.

📌 Prerequisites:

• You will need administrative rights on endpoints or domain controllers.
• This requires advanced access to the Group Policy Management Console (GPMC) or local PowerShell.
• You must have a certificate trusted by the endpoint.

Process:

1. Configure Windows Remote Management (WinRM) over HTTPS to support PowerShell remoting.
2. Create a trusted HTTPS listener via PowerShell:

winrm create winrm/config/Listener?Address=*+Transport=HTTPS @{Hostname=”serverFQDN”;CertificateThumbprint=”thumbprint”}

3. Next, disable Basic and unencrypted authentication:

winrm set winrm/config/service/auth @{Basic=”false”}
winrm set winrm/config/service @{AllowUnencrypted=”false”}

4. Enable only management subnets using firewall rules or IP filters. Replace

New-NetFirewallRule -DisplayName “Allow WinRM HTTPS” -Direction Inbound -Protocol TCP -LocalPort 5986 -RemoteAddress 192.168.10.0/24

5. Reference IBM’s WinRM Group Policy setup for domain-wide deployment.

Step 3: Configure Remote Assistance and firewall scopes

📌 Use Cases:

• This provides secure, user-guided troubleshooting when direct admin intervention is required.
• This ensures that staff can assist without exposing systems to broad access.

📌 Prerequisites:

• Verify you have local or domain admin rights on the target systems.
• Confirm you can access the Group Policy Management Console (GPMC) or the local system settings where the policies will be applied.
• Ensure support staff are added to the designated security groups that will be granted Remote Assistance rights.

Process:

1. First, enable Remote Assistance (if needed).
   1. Open the Group Policy Management Console (GPMC).
   2. Next, navigate to Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > System > Remote Assistance
   3. Enable Configure Offer Remote Assistance and Configure Solicited Remote Assistance.
2. Next, in the same window, specify your MSP’s support security groups as allowed helpers.
3. Under Solicited Remote Assistance, configure the maximum ticket lifetime (set it to 30 minutes).
4. Require user consent by ensuring Allow helpers to remotely control the computer is set to Prompt for consent.
5. In the Windows Defender Firewall, enable the following inbound rules:
   1. Remote Desktop
   2. Windows Remote Management
   3. Remote Service Management
   4. Be sure to scope them to your management networks via the Scope tab > Remote IP address

Step 4: Secure remote access by verifying settings

📌 Use Cases:

• This ensures remote access settings are correctly applied and hardened.
• It provides auditable evidence for compliance and security reviews.
• This step helps you find misconfigurations early before they become exploitable.

📌 Prerequisites:

• You will need an admin workstation with RPD and PowerShell remoting enabled.
• This step requires access to SIEM for log validation.

Process:

1. Validate all remote access configurations from an admin workstation.
2. Test RDP with Network Level Authentication (NLA) and WinRM over HTTPS.
3. Confirm event IDs for remote sign-ins and PowerShell remoting are logged in the SIEM.
4. Export snapshots for group membership, firewall scopes, and WinRM listener states for evidence. Use the following PowerShell commands:
   1. To obtain group membership data: Get-LocalGroupMember -Group “Administrators”
   2. To gather data about firewall scopes: Get-NetFirewallRule | Format-Table Name, Enabled, Direction, Action
   3. To get data about WinRM listener states: Get-WSManInstance -ResourceURI winrm/config/Listener -Enumerate
5. Maintain security strength by enforcing TLS, requiring MFA, and applying regular patching.

Step 5: Maintain remote management, rollback, and emergency console access

📌 Use Cases:

• This provides a safety net if remote management is misused or compromised.
• It ensures administrators can quickly disable RDP and WinRM while retaining access to the emergency console.

📌 Prerequisites:

• This needs admin rights to modify remote management settings.
• You will need access to Group Policy or PowerShell for disabling RDP/WinRM.

Process:

1. Establish a fast rollback plan to disable remote management if misuse or compromise is detected.
2. Be sure to keep a short runbook with commands or GPO steps to disable RDP and WinRM.
3. Maintain emergency console access independent of network authentication, like direct console, IPMI, and virtualization host console.
4. Periodically test rollback and console access to ensure availability during incidents.

Step 6: Deploy and validate remote management configurations at scale

📌 Use Cases:

• This step lets you apply consistent remote access policies across all endpoints.
• It lets you standardize WinRM, firewall, and logging configurations across domain environments.
• This ensures workgroup or hybrid devices remain aligned with enterprise security baselines.

📌 Prerequisites:

• This needs administrative rights to create and link GPOs and access to Active Directory for domain-joined systems.
• You will need a configuration management or monitoring tool capable of detecting drift, such as Intune.

Process:

1. First, apply consistent remote access policies across endpoints. Here’s how:
   1. Utilize GPOs to enforce WinRM HTTPS listeners, firewall scopes, and logging settings.
   2. Link policies to Organizational Units (OUs) containing managed systems.
2. Standardize configurations with GPOs via the following procedures:
   1. Configure WinRM service settings by following this path: Computer Configuration > Policies > Administrative Templates > Windows Components
   2. Enable predefined firewall groups for Remote Desktop, WinRM, and Remote Service Management.
   3. Configure logging policies for PowerShell script block logging and remote sign-in events.
3. Support workgroup or hybrid devices through these methods:
   1. Deploy signed PowerShell scripts to configure WinRM and firewall scopes.
   2. Validate signatures to ensure scripts are trusted and tamper-free.
4. Finally, verify and remediate configuration drift through these tasks:
   1. Regularly export snapshots of firewall rules, WinRM listener states, and group memberships.
   2. Compare against baseline configurations using PowerShell Desired State Configuration (DSC) or monitoring tools.
   3. Automate remediation where drift is detected to restore compliance.

⚠️ Things to look out for

Best practices for enabling remote administration in Windows safely

Implementation examples for safely enabling remote administration in Windows

Here are some deployment touchpoints that will help you deploy remote access administration in Windows safely.

• Enable RDP with NLA to block brute force intrusion before sessions start.
• Create a WinRM HTTPS listener to secure remote management traffic with encryption.
• Restrict firewall rules to management Classless Inter-Domain Routing (CIDR) addresses to limit access to trusted admin networks.
• You can add support groups to Remote Desktop Users to grant controlled access for authorized support teams.
• Disable Basic authentication for WinRM to prevent credential exposure in cleartext
• To verify connectivity and confirm configuration success, run test remoting calls.
• Write a JSON evidence file to capture local groups, firewall scopes, listener state, and test results with timestamps.
• Apply a GPO-backed variant to enforce the same configuration consistently across endpoints.

NinjaOne integration ideas for enabling remote management in Windows safely

• You can use NinjaOne to deploy the enablement script by device role, enabling you to apply the right configuration per system type.
• Schedule periodic verification of RDP NLA, WinRM HTTPS, firewall scopes, and local group membership to ensure ongoing compliance and security.
• Attach evidence snapshots to NinjaOne Documentation to provide proof of configuration state and audit readiness.
• Auto-open tickets in NinjaOne Ticketing when firewall scopes drift, or unauthorized accounts appear in Remote Desktop Users, to trigger immediate remediation.

Deploying Windows remote administration in your network safely

Implementing remote administration can be safe and reliable if transports are chosen deliberately, firewall exposure is scoped, authentication is modern, and evidence is collected. Once you’ve applied these settings and verified them, you can maintain predictable and auditable access.

Related topics:

• What Is Remote Access? A Comprehensive Overview
• Best Remote Access Software in 2026: Secure Remote Access Solutions
• What Is Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP)?
• Remote Commands
• What is Remote Access? [FAQs]