When you rename a security group in Active Directory through the Active Directory Users and Computers MMC console, the system updates the group's sAMAccountName and cn (common name) attributes. However, the critical objectSID (Security Identifier) remains unchanged throughout this operation.

# PowerShell example to verify SID consistency
Get-ADGroup -Identity "OldGroupName" | Select-Object SID
Get-ADGroup -Identity "NewGroupName" | Select-Object SID

All existing permissions referencing the group will continue to function because:

• NTFS file system permissions store the SID, not the group name
• Share permissions in Windows Server use SID-based authorization
• AD-integrated applications typically reference the SID or distinguishedName

To confirm permission integrity after renaming, use these technical checks:

# Check NTFS permissions (Admin PowerShell)
Get-Acl "C:\SharedFolder" | 
Select-Object -ExpandProperty Access | 
Where-Object {$_.IdentityReference -like "*NewGroupName*"}

// C# example to verify group references
using System.DirectoryServices;

DirectoryEntry groupEntry = new DirectoryEntry("LDAP://CN=NewGroupName,...");
byte[] sid = (byte[])groupEntry.Properties["objectSid"].Value;

While most systems handle renames gracefully, watch for:

1. Legacy applications that hardcode group names in configuration files
2. Third-party systems that perform name-based caching
3. Custom scripts using string matching instead of SID resolution

For large-scale deployments:

# Bulk rename with permission validation
$groups = Import-CSV "GroupRenames.csv"
foreach ($g in $groups) {
    Rename-ADObject -Identity $g.OldDN -NewName $g.NewName
    Start-Sleep -Seconds 5  # Allow replication
    Test-Path "AD:\$($g.NewDN)" | Out-Null
}

Always document changes in your Active Directory change management system and consider implementing a group naming convention standard to minimize future renames.

When you rename a security group in Active Directory using the Active Directory Users and Computers MMC snap-in, the change primarily affects the display name attribute (CN attribute in LDAP). However, the critical objectSID (Security Identifier) remains unchanged. This means:

# Before rename
Get-ADGroup "OldGroupName" | Select-Object Name, SID

# After rename
Get-ADGroup "NewGroupName" | Select-Object Name, SID
# The SID remains identical

Most Windows security systems reference groups by SID rather than display name:

• NTFS file system permissions
• Share permissions
• Group Policy security filtering
• SQL Server logins

Example of checking NTFS permissions after rename:

icacls C:\SharedFolder /find SID
# Returns the same SID before/after rename

Some systems store group names as strings rather than SIDs:

-- SQL Server example where name might be hardcoded
CREATE LOGIN [DOMAIN\OldGroupName] FROM WINDOWS;
-- This would break after rename

1. Always verify critical applications after rename
2. Use PowerShell to audit group usage first:

# Find all files where group has permissions
$groupSID = (Get-ADGroup "OldGroupName").SID.Value
Get-ChildItem -Recurse | ForEach-Object {
    (Get-Acl $_.FullName).Access | 
    Where-Object { $_.IdentityReference -like "*$groupSID*" }
}

For systems that do reference names, create update scripts:

# Update SQL logins example
Invoke-Sqlcmd -Query "ALTER LOGIN [DOMAIN\OldGroupName] WITH NAME = [DOMAIN\NewGroupName]"