OpenProcess

Description

Opens a handle to another process running on the system. This handle can be used to read and write to the other process memory or to inject code into the other process.

Syntax

HANDLE WINAPI OpenProcess(
  _In_  DWORD dwDesiredAccess,
  _In_  BOOL bInheritHandle,
  _In_  DWORD dwProcessId
);

Parameters

dwDesiredAccess [in]

The access to the process object. This access right is checked against the security descriptor for the process. This parameter can be one or more of the process access rights.

If the caller has enabled the SeDebugPrivilege privilege, the requested access is granted regardless of the contents of the security descriptor.

bInheritHandle [in]

If this value is TRUE, processes created by this process will inherit the handle. Otherwise, the processes do not inherit this handle.

dwProcessId [in]

The identifier of the local process to be opened.

If the specified process is the System Process (0x00000000), the function fails and the last error code is ERROR_INVALID_PARAMETER. If the specified process is the Idle process or one of the CSRSS processes, this function fails and the last error code is ERROR_ACCESS_DENIED because their access restrictions prevent user-level code from opening them.

If you are using GetCurrentProcessId as an argument to this function, consider using GetCurrentProcess instead of OpenProcess, for improved performance.

Return value

If the function succeeds, the return value is an open handle to the specified process.

If the function fails, the return value is NULL. To get extended error information, call GetLastError.

DLL

• Kernel32.dll