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Date:      Fri, 4 May 2001 13:20:54 +0300
From:      Peter Pentchev <roam@orbitel.bg>
To:        Brian Somers <brian@Awfulhak.org>
Cc:        Archie Cobbs <archie@packetdesign.com>, freebsd-bugs@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject:   Re: bin/26996: sshd fails when / mounted read-only
Message-ID:  <20010504132054.I13382@ringworld.oblivion.bg>
In-Reply-To: <20010504131438.H13382@ringworld.oblivion.bg>; from roam@orbitel.bg on Fri, May 04, 2001 at 01:14:38PM %2B0300
References:  <archie@packetdesign.com> <200105041010.f44AAYB29050@hak.lan.Awfulhak.org> <20010504131438.H13382@ringworld.oblivion.bg>

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On Fri, May 04, 2001 at 01:14:38PM +0300, Peter Pentchev wrote:
> On Fri, May 04, 2001 at 11:10:34AM +0100, Brian Somers wrote:
> > >  > > Also, how come e.g. telnetd doesn't have the same problem? If telnetd
> > >  > > can work why can't sshd?
> > >  > 
> > >  > Not immediately sure.
> > >  
> > >  ...so either telnetd has a security hole, or this bug can be fixed
> > >  without lessening security. Either way, we should do something.. :-)
> > >  
> > >  It seems like it should be OK to leave the tty owned by root/wheel
> > >  (if that's who owns it) because they are a secure user and group..?
> > >  I.e., if either one is broken then you have larger security problems
> > >  to worry about.
> > 
> > I'd tend to agree.  The reason the chown is desired is so that things 
> > like mesg(1) work - but in a read-only environment I'd prefer to have 
> > access with no messages than to have no access at all.
> > 
> > Of course the problem goes away with devfs - that's why I never 
> > complained about this before (despite it irritating me).
> 
> Uhm..  Maybe I'm misunderstanding something here (I probably am, too :)
> The way I see things, it's like this:
> 
> 1. initially: owned by root/wheel, mode rw-rw-rw-.
> 2. user login: mode changed to 600, so others cannot read/write to her tty;
> 3. owner changed to the user, so she can open her own tty.
> 
> I think both steps 2 and 3 are needed - or at least, if 2 is done, 3 is
> vewwy-vewwy much needed :)

Actually hmm..  If the tty's mode is initially set to 600, then there would
only be a problem if the user needed to open her tty explicitly (instead of
using the /dev/tty abstraction).  Can anyone think of a reason for that?
If not, then I guess all that's really needed is to set the tty mode to
something like root/tty 620 (to allow writes from setgid tty programs,
like write(1)), and teach login(1), sshd(8) and other login utilities
to not attempt chown/chmod's.

G'luck,
Peter

-- 
If I had finished this sentence,

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