Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2001 12:00:35 -0600 (CST) From: Mike Meyer <mwm@mired.org> To: Rahul Siddharthan <rsidd@physics.iisc.ernet.in> Cc: Terry Lambert <tlambert@primenet.com>, j mckitrick <jcm@FreeBSD-uk.eu.org>, freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: D J Bernstein (was Re: quote about open source) Message-ID: <14972.18243.202141.968666@guru.mired.org> In-Reply-To: <20010203135902.M94275@lpt.ens.fr> References: <20010202140505.B91552@dogma.freebsd-uk.eu.org> <200102022245.PAA15968@usr08.primenet.com> <20010203135902.M94275@lpt.ens.fr>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
Rahul Siddharthan <rsidd@physics.iisc.ernet.in> types: > I admit I'm no expert in programming: but his approach to security > seems to be an innovation already, like using small independent programs > running under their own non-root UIDs, and minimising the number and > power of suid programs needed. Looks obvious, but why didn't > sendmail and bind get there first? To answer the last question - because they were written when only responsible adults had internet access, or "when we were all friends" (I think those are Eric Fair's words). Compare this to BSD Unix vs. Windows: Windows grew up in a single-tasking, single-user environment, so that if a program altered things it didn't own, it was inevitably a bug. BSD Unix grew up in a university environment, with many students with no free time trying to break into them - so it wasn't at all uncommon for a program to try something it shouldn't just to see what would happen. You might also consider the many security features of SMTP of that era. As for the approach, I'm pretty sure that those aren't original to qmail. WN & GN come to mind. There's at least one tool - I believe it's in the TIS fwtk - that ran an smtp daemon to accept messages and drop them in a queue, then ran sendmail to deliver them - the performance pretty much sucked, though. DJB was the first person to apply them to a publicly released MTA, though. <mike -- Mike Meyer <mwm@mired.org> http://www.mired.org/home/mwm/ Independent WWW/Perforce/FreeBSD/Unix consultant, email for more information. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?14972.18243.202141.968666>