In the realm of cybersecurity, managing user accounts, groups, and the overall security posture of an organization’s Active Directory (AD) is paramount. PowerShell, Microsoft’s versatile automation and scripting tool, offers a rich set of cmdlets for efficient AD management. In this comprehensive article, we will explore essential AD PowerShell commands, and their applications from a cybersecurity perspective. These commands enable professionals to strengthen user management, access control, and security incident response within their AD environment.

The Get-ADUser cmdlet is the cornerstone of AD user management. With it, you can retrieve user information, apply targeted filters, and operate within specific search scopes, making it a valuable tool in cybersecurity operations.

Basic User Retrieval

To retrieve user information by specifying a SamAccountName, use the following command:

Get-ADUser -Identity jdoe

Retrieving Specific User Properties

To fetch specific user properties, such as email addresses and departments, use the -Properties parameter:

Get-ADUser -Identity jdoe -Properties EmailAddress, Department

Filtering Users

Filtering users based on criteria is a powerful feature. For example, to find all users in the “IT” department:

Get-ADUser -Filter {Department -eq "IT"}

Searching Within an OU

Limit your search to a specific Organizational Unit (OU) using the -SearchBase parameter:

Get-ADUser -Filter * -SearchBase "OU=Sales,OU=Users,DC=contoso,DC=com"

Restricting the Search Scope

Use the -SearchScope parameter to specify the search scope. For instance, to search only within the current OU:

Get-ADUser -Filter * -SearchScope OneLevel

Connecting to Specific Domain Controllers

In multi-domain environments, use -Server to connect to a particular domain controller: