Local or remote files or directories on an NTFS file system
Named pipes
Local or remote printers
Local or remote Windows services
Network shares
Registry keys
Semaphores, events, mutexes, and waitable timers
Processes, threads, jobs, and file-mapping objects
Interactive service window stations and desktops
Directory service objects

C# Signature:

[DllImport("advapi32.dll", SetLastError=true)]
static extern uint GetSecurityInfo(
HANDLE handle,
SE_OBJECT_TYPE ObjectType,
SECURITY_INFORMATION SecurityInfo,
out IntPtr pSidOwner,
out IntPtr  pSidGroup,
out IntPtr pDacl,
out IntPtr pSacl,
out IntPtr pSecurityDescriptor);

VB Signature:

Declare Function GetSecurityInfo Lib "advapi32.dll" (TODO) As TODO

User-Defined Types:

Alternative Managed API:

Do you know one? Please contribute it!

Notes:

I am currently trying to implement this function to get the security attributes for Network Shares.

Tips & Tricks:

Please add some!

Sample Code:

C#

Compiled for 2.0 but I guess it should work for 1.1. (Of course 2.0 provides the AccessControl namespace which makes this sample only interesting for knowing the basics of how it is done)

This sample only retrieves the owner of the object (in this case a file but could be other object if you change the objectType)

using System;

using System.Collections.Generic;

using System.Text;

using System.IO;

using System.Runtime.InteropServices;

using System.Security.AccessControl;

namespace GetSecurityInfoTest

{

    class Program
    {
    [DllImport("advapi32.dll", SetLastError = true)]
    static extern int GetSecurityInfo(
        IntPtr          handle,
        SE_OBJECT_TYPE         objectType,
        SECURITY_INFORMATION     securityInfo,
        out IntPtr          sidOwner,
        out IntPtr          sidGroup,
        out IntPtr          dacl,
        out IntPtr          sacl,
        out IntPtr          securityDescriptor);

    [DllImport("advapi32", CharSet = CharSet.Unicode, SetLastError = true)]
    static extern bool ConvertSidToStringSid(
        IntPtr              sid,
        out IntPtr          sidString);      

    [DllImport("kernel32.dll", SetLastError = true)]
    internal static extern IntPtr LocalFree(
        IntPtr         handle
    );

    enum SE_OBJECT_TYPE
    {
        SE_UNKNOWN_OBJECT_TYPE,
        SE_FILE_OBJECT,
        SE_SERVICE,
        SE_PRINTER,
        SE_REGISTRY_KEY,
        SE_LMSHARE,
        SE_KERNEL_OBJECT,
        SE_WINDOW_OBJECT,
        SE_DS_OBJECT,
        SE_DS_OBJECT_ALL,
        SE_PROVIDER_DEFINED_OBJECT,
        SE_WMIGUID_OBJECT,
        SE_REGISTRY_WOW64_32KEY
    }
    enum SECURITY_INFORMATION
    {
        OWNER_SECURITY_INFORMATION = 1,
        GROUP_SECURITY_INFORMATION = 2,
        DACL_SECURITY_INFORMATION = 4,
        SACL_SECURITY_INFORMATION = 8,        
    }

    static void Main(string[] args)
    {
        FileStream fileStream = null;        
        IntPtr ownerSid;
        IntPtr groupSid;
        IntPtr dacl;
        IntPtr sacl;
        IntPtr securityDescriptor = IntPtr.Zero;

        int returnValue = 0;
        bool success = false;

        try
        {
        fileStream = File.Open(@"C:\Test\Test.txt", FileMode.Open);

        returnValue = GetSecurityInfo(fileStream.Handle, SE_OBJECT_TYPE.SE_FILE_OBJECT, SECURITY_INFORMATION.OWNER_SECURITY_INFORMATION | SECURITY_INFORMATION.DACL_SECURITY_INFORMATION, out ownerSid, out groupSid, out dacl, out sacl, out securityDescriptor);          

        IntPtr sidString = IntPtr.Zero;
        success = ConvertSidToStringSid(ownerSid, out sidString);
        Console.WriteLine(Marshal.PtrToStringAuto(sidString));
        Marshal.FreeHGlobal(sidString);
        }
        finally
        {
        LocalFree(securityDescriptor);
        fileStream.Close();
        }          
    }
    }

}