How to disable automatic network connection on windows startup?

cppbest

3/9/24, 2:35 PM

So in Linux you need to manually run some commands or write config files to connect to the network. Before these steps you can use the system perfectly fine without a connection. Is something like this possible on Windows 10? Currently, even if I haven't login yet I see a bunch of packets running somewhere. That is: is it possible to use Windows offline without disabling a network adapter or intentionally misconfiguring your connection?

1 + 2

networking

linux

windows

internet

windows-10

vidarlo

3/9/24, 2:50 PM

Unplug the cable?

cppbest

3/9/24, 2:57 PM

@vidarlo yeah, but I want to do it at the software level.

Score:0

Server

Jevgenij Martynenko

3/9/24, 2:52 PM

If you mean wired connection, there is nothing out of the box. But you could schedule scripts for that. One would disable connection on device start up, another would enable it on user sign-in or manually by running the script.

The proper way to do this is actually not the device, but a network layer. For example, you could implement network layer authentication with .1X and user credentials. This way network will be down until user logs in and authenticates successfully. You need aditional infrastructure to achieve this, like support of .1X protocol on your network switches and some server to do authentication (Windows server can do that)

Another option might be some kind of third-party software, but it is out of scope and I can't even recommend any.

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cppbest

3/9/24, 3:00 PM

Interesting. Is it possible to schedule these user scripts before any system process that inits a connection? Please provide some links that I should read.

Jevgenij Martynenko

3/9/24, 4:25 PM

I have updated my answer to better meet your requirements

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