ConnectNetworkAsync fails when not logged in locally or via RDP

[prushik]

I have an application that runs in the background. Typically, it is started through an RDP connection, but eventually we will run as a service. Everything works fine when we are still logged in, but if we start running and then disconnect from RDP, we get an exception on ConnectNetworkAsync:

System.ComponentModel.Win32Exception: 'MethodName: WlanConnect, ErrorCode: 87, ErrorMessage: The parameter is incorrect. '

The following code should help to reproduce the issue:

// give time to log out to trigger the issue
Thread.Sleep(10000);

// create profile
ManagedNativeWifi.NativeWifi.SetProfile(iface.Id, ProfileType.PerUser, CreateProfileXml(ssid+"_test", ssid, passwd), null, true);

// the following line works correctly while logged in, but throws an exception when logged out
bool connect_success = ManagedNativeWifi.NativeWifi.ConnectNetworkAsync(iface.Id, ssid + "_test", BssType.Infrastructure, new System.Net.NetworkInformation.PhysicalAddress(Array.ConvertAll(bssid.Split(':'), x => Convert.ToByte(x, 16))), new TimeSpan(0, 1, 0), new CancellationToken()).GetAwaiter().GetResult();

// ... snip ...

private static string CreateProfileXml(string profileName, string ssidString, string password) =>
	$@"<?xml version=""1.0""?>
<WLANProfile xmlns=""http://www.microsoft.com/networking/WLAN/profile/v1"">
	<name>{profileName}</name>
	<SSIDConfig>
		<SSID>
			<hex>{toHex(ssidString)}</hex>
			<name>{ssidString}</name>
		</SSID>
	</SSIDConfig>
	<connectionType>ESS</connectionType>
	<connectionMode>manual</connectionMode>
	<MSM>
		<security>
			<authEncryption>
				<authentication>WPA2PSK</authentication>
				<encryption>AES</encryption>
				<useOneX>false</useOneX>
			</authEncryption>
			<sharedKey>
				<keyType>passPhrase</keyType>
				<protected>false</protected>
				<keyMaterial>{password}</keyMaterial>
			</sharedKey>
		</security>
	</MSM>
</WLANProfile>";