You click the shared printer and Windows answers: operation failed with error 0x0000011b. The printer worked last month, nothing was changed — except Windows Update. Here is why it started, and the fix order from safest to last resort.
Error 0x0000011b is not a broken printer and not a broken cable. It is a disagreement between two PCs: the computer sharing the printer (the host) and the computer connecting to it (the client) are enforcing different security levels for the print connection, so the connection is refused. Microsoft raised the security level in the 2021 PrintNightmare updates, and any pair of PCs that ended up on different levels started failing with exactly this code. Fix it in the order below — safest first — and stop the moment the printer connects.
Windows cannot connect to the printer
Check the printer name and try connecting again. If this is a network printer, make sure the printer is turned on, and that the address is correct.
Operation failed with error 0x0000011b.
👆 The exact dialog most users see when a client PC connects to a shared printer (panel recreated with the real Windows wording)
When a client connects to a shared printer, the two PCs talk over RPC (Remote Procedure Call). After the PrintNightmare fixes, Windows expects that conversation to use an authenticated, privacy-protected RPC level. If one side demands the high level and the other side cannot offer it — because it is unpatched, or its setting was changed — the connection is rejected with 0x0000011b. The printer, the driver files and the network are usually all fine. The two PCs simply do not agree on how secure the conversation must be.
Do the cheap step first, on both computers — host and client:
services.msc on both, find Print Spooler, and choose RestartA half-applied update or a stuck spooler can leave the old security behaviour loaded in memory. A clean restart rules that out in two minutes.
This is the fix that ends the problem permanently, because the mismatch itself is the disease: one PC has the September 2021 print hardening (the KB5005565 update family) and the other does not.
It makes no difference whether the pair is Windows 10 with Windows 10, Windows 11 with Windows 10, or any other mix — the operating system version is not the point, the patch level is. Both sides patched to current means both sides speak the same security level, and 0x0000011b has no reason to exist.
If both PCs are updated and the error stays on this one client, its saved printer connection and driver copy are stale. Remove them properly instead of just deleting the icon:
printui /s /t2 and remove the old driver for that printer model if it is listed and unusedservices.mscHonest note: removing a driver in the printui dialog only works when no printer still uses it — if Windows refuses, remove every queue using that driver first, or leave the driver and just rebuild the connection.
No security agreement matters if the printing service itself is stopped. On host and client, open services.msc and confirm:
If the host genuinely cannot be patched yet — say it runs old software that a vendor must certify first — there is a documented bridge: on the host only, create the DWORD value RpcAuthnLevelPrivacyEnabled set to 0 under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Print, then restart the Print Spooler. This tells the host to stop demanding the privacy-protected RPC level, so older clients can connect again.
Be clear about what you just did: you switched off a security protection that exists because the print spooler was remotely exploitable. Treat it as a bridge — note the date, put a reminder in the calendar, and remove the value (or set it back to 1) the day the host is patched. Never spray this setting across every PC in an office.
The video walks through this same fix order on a real shared printer — the update check, the clean re-add, and the registry step shown with its warning.
▶️ Watch Full VideoBecause something did change: Windows Update. The September 2021 updates (the KB5005565 family) raised the required RPC security level for shared printing on the PCs that received them. The first time a patched PC and an unpatched PC tried to talk after that, the connection was refused with 0x0000011b.
No. It is a security-level mismatch between the print host and the client PC. The printer hardware, the cable and the network are normally fine — the same printer keeps working from the host PC itself, which is the quickest proof.
You can, but you should not. A value of 0 means the host no longer enforces privacy-protected RPC for print connections — part of the protection added against the PrintNightmare vulnerability. Patch the host when you can, then set the value back to 1 or delete it.