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MS SQL locks sa account out automatically on having wrong password entered.

Strange behavior from MS SQL Server 2005. I "spontaneously" get this error when trying to connect: 

Login failed for user 'sa' because the account is currently locked out. The system administrator can unlock it.  (Microsoft SQL Server, Error: 18486).

After some digging I've found this useful chain of posts, logged into the server locally and ran the following line: ALTER LOGIN sa WITH PASSWORD = 'your_password_here' UNLOCK

I suspect what happened was that MS SQL Server decided to lock the sa login after I made a few login attempts with the wrong password. Assuming that's what happened, does anybody know how to change this "lockdown" behavior on behalf of MS SQL Server 2005?

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Print | posted on Monday, May 29, 2006 3:36 PM

Comments on this post

# re: MS SQL locks sa account out automatically on having wrong password entered.

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Interesting piece of information. Btw check out http://vadivel.blogspot.com/2005/11/list-of-my-sql-articles-tips.html at your leisure.
Left by Vadivel on May 30, 2006 5:57 AM

# re: MS SQL locks sa account out automatically on having wrong password entered.

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Yes, u can permanently get rid of this, follow this:
Security --> Logins --> sa --> Properties --> unchecked: Enforce password policy.

Left by Gaurav Garg on Dec 18, 2006 10:44 AM

# re: MS SQL locks sa account out automatically on having wrong password entered.

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# re: MS SQL locks sa account out automatically on having wrong password entered.
Yes, u can permanently get rid of this, follow this:
Security --> Logins --> sa --> Properties --> unchecked: Enforce password policy.
Left by sastry on Feb 19, 2009 10:37 PM

# re: MS SQL locks sa account out automatically on having wrong password entered.

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Hello friends i am using in MS SQL 2005 , my mssql SA security login is automatically changed it , why change , then any permenent solution in MS SQL 'sa' login error
Left by VEERAMANIKANDAN on Mar 16, 2010 12:18 AM

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