Microsoft Account Sign-in Assistant service terminated with the following error: The system cannot find the file specified

rpr 111 Reputation points
2023-11-15T14:28:27.8166667+00:00

On a Windows 10 Pro. 22H2 machine I noticed that the following error is being logged in the Event Log every 5 minutes:

Log Name:      System
Source:        Service Control Manager
Event ID:      7023
Level:         Error
Description:
The Microsoft Account Sign-in Assistant service terminated with the following error: 
The system cannot find the file specified.

The issue started about ten days ago.

The Microsoft Account Sign-in Assistant service (wlidsvc) has startup type: Manual (Triggered Start). It is described as

Enables user sign-in through Microsoft account identity services. If this service is stopped, users will not be able to logon to the computer with their Microsoft account.

When I try to start the service manually, I get the above error.

The user is not using a Microsoft private account but logs in to local Windows domain which has accounts synchronized to Azure AD (MS Entra ID). It means that the user has Microsoft work account that is used in Microsoft 365 apps and online services (Exchange Online, etc.). The user has no issues in connecting to the online services.

I run the following commands on the machine, which finished successfully, but after restart the issue remained:

sfc /scannow
DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth

Any suggestion how to solve this?

Windows 10
Windows 10
A Microsoft operating system that runs on personal computers and tablets.
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  1. rpr 111 Reputation points
    2024-02-07T12:50:27.1566667+00:00

    Regarding this issue I also noticed that Microsoft Store does not work correctly - it opens with a blank window. It seems it is also caused by wlidsvc service not being able to start. For Microsoft Store problem I found suggestions to repair Windows 10 installation. So, I first ran

    sfc /scannow
    DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth
    

    Then started the repair by mounting the Windows 10 22H2 installation ISO file and running setup.exe (see here). The procedure is equivalent to upgrading Windows 10. After the Windows repair, the Microsoft Account Sign-in Assistant service became functional and also Microsoft Store. -- rpr.

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