[NCLUG] Why not Root?

Sean Reifschneider jafo at tummy.com
Sun Mar 18 19:43:15 MDT 2007


On Sat, Mar 17, 2007 at 10:12:37PM -0600, Dave Treece wrote:
>   Just my two cents worth, but as a single user I don't think it 
>really matters much. I can bring down a system as a regular user just as 
>easily as a root user. I've been playing with a few ram only linux 

That's only because your Linux setup is not using user limits..  There are
plenty of ways to restrct it so that regular users can't nearly as easily
take down a machine.

Also, when a system is compromised, if the compromise happens at a user
level it can be much easier to clean up from without re-installing the
whole OS.  However, if that exploit happens as root, it is much more
difficult, if not impossible, to be sure you've cleaned up what the
intruder has done.

Sean
-- 
 Brooks's Law of Prototypes: Plan to throw one away, you will anyhow.
Sean Reifschneider, Member of Technical Staff <jafo at tummy.com>
tummy.com, ltd. - Linux Consulting since 1995: Ask me about High Availability
      Back off man. I'm a scientist.   http://HackingSociety.org/




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