Netwrix Account Lockout

So recently i had a very annoying issue with an account that was constantly locking out, i would unlock it and 20 or so minutes later it would lock again, this went on for a few days until i decided enough was enough.  Time to find out what the culprit was for this random event, now finding out what the root cause of a locked out account is not as easy as you think, you can trawl though event logs, setup an automatic rule to unlock users, or as i have discovered you can use a free tool called Netwrix Account Lockup Examiner.

The great thing about this software is it will give you the originating computer name, so you can go find out what is actually going on and fix the issue for good, i have been using this software now for a few years and the detail it gives you can be a life saver, its really easy to install and use and the best part is its free.

The installation is very straight forward, and once installed you basically point it to your domain, it verifies the controllers and thats pretty much it, your locked out accounts will appear in the list and you can right click on each one to unlock, it will give you detailed information about what account has been locked, when it locked and from where the lock occurred.  You can also see if an account has locked multiple times or if this is just a one off.

A very hand tool for account lockouts, and another string to your bow in the world of IT support.