From owner-freebsd-security Sun Jul 12 15:02:56 1998 Return-Path: Received: (from majordom@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) id PAA17363 for freebsd-security-outgoing; Sun, 12 Jul 1998 15:02:56 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-security@FreeBSD.ORG) Received: from obie.softweyr.com ([204.68.178.33]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id PAA17358 for ; Sun, 12 Jul 1998 15:02:52 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from wes@softweyr.com) Received: from obie.softweyr.com (zaphod.softweyr.com [204.68.178.35]) by obie.softweyr.com (8.8.8/8.8.8) with SMTP id PAA10573; Sun, 12 Jul 1998 15:59:50 -0600 (MDT) (envelope-from wes@softweyr.com) Date: Sun, 12 Jul 1998 15:59:50 -0600 (MDT) Message-Id: <199807122159.PAA10573@obie.softweyr.com> Subject: Re: RootRunner (admin GUI w/o security holes?) From: Wes Peters To: kgor@ksg.com, andrew@squiz.co.nz Cc: jehamby@manta.jpl.nasa.gov, 026809r@dragon.acadiau.ca, security@FreeBSD.ORG Reply-To: Wes Peters In-Reply-To: References: X-Priority: 3 (Normal) X-Mailer: BeatWare Mail-It 1.6 X-BeOS-Platform: Intel or clone Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by hub.freebsd.org id PAA17359 Sender: owner-freebsd-security@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.org My hidden microphone recorded Andrew McNaughton (andrew@squiz.co.nz) saying: % I suspect the only way to get a uid = 0 backend and a uid != 0 frontend % is to run them as separate processes with some sort of communication % channel. It's certainly the only good way. It is important to secure the communication channel also; you'd be surprised what you can find in the clear snooping unix-domain sockets and the like. Contrary to what many will tell you, even a simple encryption or ENCODING method will dissuade most of your potential attackers; they'll go look for other "low-hanging fruit." If you make your standard communications channel a TCP socket, you're building in remote administration capabilities from the start. You have to pay attention to authentication and communication security, but you really need to do that anyhow, so why shy away from it at the start? -- "Where am I, and what am I doing in this handbasket?" Wes Peters Softweyr LLC http://www.softweyr.com/~softweyr wes@softweyr.com To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe security" in the body of the message