Windows 11 prompts for password change, user changes but then days later Windows say wrong password?

I've had multiple friends and family report that Windows 11 suddenly prompted them to change their password (no option not to change it) and they then changed the password and it worked for days or a few weeks but then the user goes to login and Windows then says "Incorrect password" even though they are using the most recent password that in fact worked yesterday. I'm now on the 5th friend who's having this problem, I've been fixing it using boot media to enable the admin account and set a new password for admin and then boot up and login as admin to forcibly change the users password and then disable the admin account after logging in as the user.

My question is, am I the only person having this problem and why does this keep happening to random users?

Is this any use?: -

wiganken said:

Is this any use?: -

Enable or Disable Password Expiration in Windows 11

This tutorial will show you how to enable or disable password expiration for an account in Windows 10 and Windows 11. When you enable password expiration for an account, the user will be forced to change their password the next time they sign in when it expires. A local account password will...

www.elevenforum.com

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That will defiantly help with Home users who don't have the option in the settings to change that setting.

I'd just really like to know why at some point days or weeks after changing the password that neither the new or old password works and they can't get access to their system without having to go to crazy lengths to change it? Also it appears that multiple reboots eventually allow the user to log in with the new password, I found this out today and just don't understand it.

Am I missing something? I have been using Windows at home for almost 30 years. I have never had a Windows password expire.

I believe there is an option to set this to some value but the the default is never. I don't know why a home user would want to change that. Years ago I worked at a place that set the Windows password to expire regularly. We all hated that.

MisterEd said:

I believe there is an option to set this to some value but the the default is never. I don't know why a home user would want to change that.

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Yes, the default is 'never', but I have found on rare occasions that a clean install of Win7 or Win10 had set accounts to expire. Never worked out why. Quickly set it to 'never' as soon as I got the expiry warning.

NormAtHome said:

multiple friends and family

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NormAtHome said:

am I the only person having this problem

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Obviously not.

NormAtHome said:

why does this keep happening to random users?

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Hard to work out who these people are, friends, family, random users. Who are the random users? Have you been reading this happening somewhere? Can you link us?

Is there a relatable factor to all the above mentioned, like did you work on all of these peoples computers?

MisterEd said:

Am I missing something? I have been using Windows at home for almost 30 years. I have never had a Windows password expire.

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Me either.

Bree said:

Yes, the default is 'never', but I have found on rare occasions that a clean install of Win7 or Win10 had set accounts to expire. Never worked out why. Quickly set it to 'never' as soon as I got the expiry warning.

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It's my belief that a recent Windows update has caused the Windows Home user default of "password never expires" to Password expires on at least some computers; . In every case it's Windows 11 Home (my current computer which is about 18 months old has Windows 11 pro and it has never prompted me to change the password) and friends and family have had the computers they're working on for as least six months and in some cases several years. Yes they are all people who's computers I either setup for them or purchased and setup for them. As a side note, each of these computers is setup with a local account only as none of them want a Microsoft account or any of their files backed up to Microsoft's cloud; they all either backup manually or use something like Carbonite. If I count it up it's five people who've been prompted and given no choice about changing their password, as of today three of them have had the problem I've described where days or at max three weeks later they've gone to sign in and their computer says "incorrect password" although the person complaining today was able to login with the most recent password after rebooting 6-10 times. This computer is an HP ENVY (I don't have the exact model) but it was brand new in March and requested a password change maybe 2-3 weeks ago.

I'm mainly trying to find out if anyone else who's been prompted to change their password has then had that password fail to work in the time frame I mentioned.

antspants said:

Obviously not.



Hard to work out who these people are, friends, family, random users. Who are the random users? Have you been reading this happening somewhere? Can you link us?

Is there a relatable factor to all the above mentioned, like did you work on all of these peoples computers?



Me either.

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Seriously? I mean the only person seeing people change their password and then days or weeks later having the new password rejected as "incorrect password".

NormAtHome said:

Seriously?

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Yes. Members will ask you questions to try and help.

NormAtHome said:

Yes they are all people who's computers I either setup for them or purchased and setup for them.

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I see no other mention of this happening on the brief search I did regarding Windows 11 users being asked to change their password. The most recent event of this happening when I searched was from 2023. If it was a Windows update issue, I am sure there would be more than the few people you personally know.