How to Find a Users SID on Windows

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Written by Nicole Levine, MFA

Last Updated: September 6, 2019 Tested

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This wikiHow teaches you how to look up the Security Identifier (SID) of another user on a Windows PC.

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1. 
   1
   Press ⊞ Win+X. This opens the Windows “power user” menu at the bottom-left corner of the screen.
2. 
   2
   Click Command Prompt (Admin). A confirmation message will appear.
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3. 
   3
   Click Yes. Now you'll see a terminal window displaying the command prompt.
4. 
   4
   Type WMIC useraccount get name,sid. This is the command to display the SIDs of all user accounts on the system.

   • If you know the person's username, use this command instead: wmic useraccount where name="USER" get sid (but replace USER with the username).
5. 
   5
   Press ↵ Enter. The SID is the long number that appears after each username.
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• Question

  What is a Windows SID?

  

  Community Answer

  An SID, or "security identifier," is a unique number used to identify users, groups, and computer accounts in Windows. SIDs are generated when an account is created, ensuring that no two SIDs on a computer are identical. The term "security ID" is sometimes used interchangeably with SID.

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