Re: security hole?
Well boys and girls it appears I have touched a nerve. Granted, almost without exception any security scheme can be breached--however thats no excuse to give everyone a key to the front door. Allowing root access to anyone who merely uses a boot rescue disk is, in my opinion, rediculous. You may disagree, thats ok, your allowed to. Nevertheless, if you need an OS which treats root access a littlie more securely consider alternatives such as Redhat or FreeBSD. If you "forget" you root password you cannot merely insert a "resue disk" (a so neither can anyone else) and break in as root. With regard to data visibility--the concern is more then just whether or not someone else can see the data--it is what they can do as root which might breach the security of your network long after the initial breach. Please feel free not to respond if you do not want to. I'm not asking a question--just making a comment. Don't get your panties all in abunch. Regards, Lee
GranteAllowing root access to anyone who merely uses a boot rescue disk is, in my opinion, rediculous.
If you "forget" you root password you cannot merely insert a "resue disk" (a so neither can anyone else) and break in as root.
Are you joking? How much can you bet that I will break into a redhat system just like you have just said, with a boot disk. Your statements are a little ridiculous, but I know you are only wanting to troll a bit. Bye bye
Weelllll, I haven't dinked with Redhat since 5.0 but I will bet you can't do that with FreeBSD or Solaris (for the pc) or (please note I am loath to say this) W2kserver/Advanced Server (at least trying to breach admin permissions with a boot disk). I confess that there is a degree of "trolling" here, but not entirely. In anycase I am on my way out the door. Good luck and enjoy your weekend (if you so choose). LOL Regards, Lee Praise wrote:
GranteAllowing root access to anyone who merely uses a boot rescue disk is, in my opinion, rediculous.
If you "forget" you root password you cannot merely insert a "resue disk" (a so neither can anyone else) and break in as root.
Are you joking? How much can you bet that I will break into a redhat system just like you have just said, with a boot disk. Your statements are a little ridiculous, but I know you are only wanting to troll a bit.
Bye bye
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I know I'm at risk of feeding the trolling idiot, but... On Sat, Jul 13, 2002 at 11:33:36AM -0400, leemav@attbi.com wrote:
I haven't dinked with Redhat since 5.0 but I will bet you can't do that with FreeBSD
Like I said before, I've never used FreeBSD, but I doubt it's different.
or Solaris (for the pc)
I would be willing to bet that if you removed the HDD from the machine, and plugged it into another machine, you could mount the root FS, and get access. This is effectively the same thing. The only reason that you probably can't do it is that Solaris is too big to run off a boot floppy, and no-one has bothered to write a Solaris FS driver for Linux (yet). If they have, then you could just boot a Linux bootdisk, and go in and modify anything you like.
or (please note I am loath to say this) W2kserver/Advanced Server (at least trying to breach admin permissions with a boot disk).
Again, only because no-one has written an NTFS driver for Linux (or anything else), because M$ make the thing as complicated as possible, and don't release the specs. The fact that the various security holes in M$ IIS and LookOut aren't documented didn't stop anyone from exploiting them. Security through obscurity is no security at all.
I confess that there is a degree of "trolling" here, but not entirely. In anycase I am on my way out the door. Good luck and enjoy your weekend (if you so choose). LOL
If you truly are trolling, then I would recommend that you get a life, and then actually learn something about the subject before spouting off. If you are not, the second recommendation holds. -- David Smith Work Email: Dave.Smith@st.com STMicroelectronics Home Email: David.Smith@ds-electronics.co.uk Bristol, England
Davy, Don't be such a pretentious fop. This thread started as a complaint by someone that they could get root access by merely using a "rescue disk" My comments where made in this context and so still hold (with the exception of redhat 5--perhaps). With regard to being able to get through almost any secrity -- that was conceeded in my first post. A big DUH! to those who responded without obviously having read the whole post. Don't be so enamored with yourself, as you indicate in your post you really don't now what you are talking about but are venturing to make a guess. That's fair--but no need to be an ass about it. Again, my comments where made within the context or the ORIGINAL posted complaint. Regards, Lee Dave Smith wrote:
I know I'm at risk of feeding the trolling idiot, but...
On Sat, Jul 13, 2002 at 11:33:36AM -0400, leemav@attbi.com wrote:
I haven't dinked with Redhat since 5.0 but I will bet you can't do that with FreeBSD
Like I said before, I've never used FreeBSD, but I doubt it's different.
or Solaris (for the pc)
I would be willing to bet that if you removed the HDD from the machine, and plugged it into another machine, you could mount the root FS, and get access. This is effectively the same thing. The only reason that you probably can't do it is that Solaris is too big to run off a boot floppy, and no-one has bothered to write a Solaris FS driver for Linux (yet). If they have, then you could just boot a Linux bootdisk, and go in and modify anything you like.
or (please note I am loath to say this) W2kserver/Advanced Server (at least trying to breach admin permissions with a boot disk).
Again, only because no-one has written an NTFS driver for Linux (or anything else), because M$ make the thing as complicated as possible, and don't release the specs. The fact that the various security holes in M$ IIS and LookOut aren't documented didn't stop anyone from exploiting them.
Security through obscurity is no security at all.
I confess that there is a degree of "trolling" here, but not entirely. In anycase I am on my way out the door. Good luck and enjoy your weekend (if you so choose). LOL
If you truly are trolling, then I would recommend that you get a life, and then actually learn something about the subject before spouting off.
If you are not, the second recommendation holds.
-- David Smith Work Email: Dave.Smith@st.com STMicroelectronics Home Email: David.Smith@ds-electronics.co.uk Bristol, England
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::> This is effectively the same thing. The only reason that you probably can't ::> do it is that Solaris is too big to run off a boot floppy, and no-one has ::> bothered to write a Solaris FS driver for Linux (yet). If they have, then ::> you could just boot a Linux bootdisk, and go in and modify anything you ::> like. You better believe Linux can read UFS filesystems which is the default Solaris FS. :) ::> If you truly are trolling, then I would recommend that you get a life, and ::> then actually learn something about the subject before spouting off. I doubt the person was trolling anything. And as proven from the above corrections about the ability of Linux to read the Solaris UFS filesystem..you might take your own advice. -=Ben --=====-----=====-- mailto:ben@whack.org --=====-- Tell me what you believe..I tell you what you should see. -DP --=====-----=====--
Op zondag 14 juli 2002 23:00, schreef Ben Rosenberg:
::> This is effectively the same thing. The only reason that you ::> probably can't do it is that Solaris is too big to run off a boot ::> floppy, and no-one has bothered to write a Solaris FS driver for ::> Linux (yet). If they have, then you could just boot a Linux ::> bootdisk, and go in and modify anything you like.
You better believe Linux can read UFS filesystems which is the default Solaris FS. :)
::> If you truly are trolling, then I would recommend that you get a ::> life, and then actually learn something about the subject before ::> spouting off.
I doubt the person was trolling anything. And as proven from the above corrections about the ability of Linux to read the Solaris UFS filesystem..you might take your own advice.
-=Ben
Almost every Sun box comes with a cdrom/dvd-drive nowadays, so you'll be able to boot from the Solaris setup cd, mount the necessary slice and remove the passwd for root. Reboot and you're in. 5 minutes, tops. No need to remove the hard drive and mount it in a Linux box, but i guess you already knew that Ben ;-) cheers, Marcel
* Marcel Broekman (m.broek@chello.nl) [020714 14:33]: :: ::Almost every Sun box comes with a cdrom/dvd-drive nowadays, so you'll be ::able to boot from the Solaris setup cd, mount the necessary slice and ::remove the passwd for root. Reboot and you're in. 5 minutes, tops. ::No need to remove the hard drive and mount it in a Linux box, but i ::guess you already knew that Ben ;-) :: Yep. I did. :) I was more or less saying that there are facilities to have Linux read the UFS filesystem. Also, to say that one shouldn't tell another to get a life and not speak on a subject that they haven't a clue about when the person speaking didn't have a clue. It's cool. NO worries. :) -=Ben --=====-----=====-- mailto:ben@whack.org --=====-- Tell me what you believe..I tell you what you should see. -DP --=====-----=====--
Op zondag 14 juli 2002 22:31, schreef Lee Mavrogenis:
Davy,
Don't be such a pretentious fop. This thread started as a complaint by someone that they could get root access by merely using a "rescue disk" My comments where made in this context and so still hold (with the exception of redhat 5--perhaps).
With regard to being able to get through almost any secrity -- that was conceeded in my first post. A big DUH! to those who responded without obviously having read the whole post.
Don't be so enamored with yourself, as you indicate in your post you really don't now what you are talking about but are venturing to make a guess. That's fair--but no need to be an ass about it.
Again, my comments where made within the context or the ORIGINAL posted complaint.
Regards,
Lee
Lee, Point is that if you know what you're doing and you have physical access to any machine with any OS you can have root access within minutes, be it with a floppy disk, cdrom or removing the hd and mount it in another box. Saying that SuSE (or any other OS for that matter) is weak in that respect is bollocks. If you have to be that serious about the security of your boxes, you better know how to make them more secure and don't stick with the default install. That ultimately means that you'll have to keep them behind closed and locked doors. Cheers, Marcel
Marcel (and Ben as well), Thank you. I have embedded a couple of comments. Please note there was never any intent on my part to troll--so lets be clear about that. With regard to security breaches: -- Yes, I believe I stated as much (in essense) in my post as follows -- "Granted, almost without exception any security scheme can be breached....." As far as root access from a boot/rescue disk (again, this being in context to the original posted complaint) - within that strict context I am not aware of being able use a boot disk with W2k Server or Advanced Server to acquire root (admin) permissions - unless you do a full install. (I not talking about just being able to puruse the data on the disk I am talking about being able to serreptitiously act as the administrator -- by using a simple boot or rescue disk.) If you know how to do this I am certainly willing to listen. With regard to Solaris I had tried this a while back and was unsuccessful--and apparently erroneously concluded that root could not be acquired as easily as with a Linux rescue disk. (Note I didn't try a Linux disk but used the Solaris start-up floppy - 7.0 fot the pc). Now having the knowledge that this is indeed possible-and easily at that- I will give it a go. Thank you. I accept the critisism that I was a bit unfair with regard to singling out SuSE -- to all please accept my humble apologizes. Nevertheless (and here is where I respectfully disagree) I still think that with respect to a rescue/boot disk unless the root password is actually known it should not be allowed to be "reset" under any circumstances. Again this is an opinion. The down side is that if you forget the root password you will need to reinstall the OS--I think that is appropriate. Regards, Lee Marcel Broekman wrote:
Op zondag 14 juli 2002 22:31, schreef Lee Mavrogenis:
Davy,
Don't be such a pretentious fop. This thread started as a complaint by someone that they could get root access by merely using a "rescue disk" My comments where made in this context and so still hold (with the exception of redhat 5--perhaps).
With regard to being able to get through almost any secrity -- that was conceeded in my first post. A big DUH! to those who responded without obviously having read the whole post.
Don't be so enamored with yourself, as you indicate in your post you really don't now what you are talking about but are venturing to make a guess. That's fair--but no need to be an ass about it.
Again, my comments where made within the context or the ORIGINAL posted complaint.
Regards,
Lee
Lee,
Point is that if you know what you're doing and you have physical access to any machine with any OS you can have root access within minutes, be it with a floppy disk, cdrom or removing the hd and mount it in another box. Saying that SuSE (or any other OS for that matter) is weak in that respect is bollocks. If you have to be that serious about the security of your boxes, you better know how to make them more secure and don't stick with the default install. That ultimately means that you'll have to keep them behind closed and locked doors.
Cheers, Marcel
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On Monday 15 July 2002 01.00, Lee Mavrogenis wrote:
Marcel (and Ben as well),
Thank you. I have embedded a couple of comments. Please note there was never
any intent on my part to troll--so lets be clear about that.
Of course there was. It was a classic troll, and you even admitted it.
With regard to security breaches: -- Yes, I believe I stated as much (in essense) in my post as follows -- "Granted, almost without exception any security scheme can be breached....."
As far as root access from a boot/rescue disk (again, this being in context to the original posted complaint) - within that strict context I am not aware of being able use a boot disk with W2k Server or Advanced Server to acquire root (admin) permissions - unless you do a full install. (I not talking about just being able to puruse the data on the disk I am talking about being able to serreptitiously act as the administrator -- by using a simple boot or rescue disk.) If you know how to do this I am certainly willing to listen.
You may be right, I don't know. You'd have to go to a windows discussion forum for that. BUT it's not because windows is in any way more secure, it looks like the guys in Redmond want to earn a few $$$ on what is in the *nix world (NB! ANY *nix dialect, including ALL versions of RedHat, ALL versions of *BSD) a routine procedure http://www.lostpassword.com/windows-xp-2000-nt.htm //Anders
Anders, I have said enough on the first point and must leave it at what I have said. With regard to the link--thank you very much! And thank you all, I have been thrice enlightened! Regards, Lee Anders Johansson wrote:
On Monday 15 July 2002 01.00, Lee Mavrogenis wrote:
Marcel (and Ben as well),
Thank you. I have embedded a couple of comments. Please note there was never
any intent on my part to troll--so lets be clear about that.
Of course there was. It was a classic troll, and you even admitted it.
With regard to security breaches: -- Yes, I believe I stated as much (in essense) in my post as follows -- "Granted, almost without exception any security scheme can be breached....."
As far as root access from a boot/rescue disk (again, this being in context to the original posted complaint) - within that strict context I am not aware of being able use a boot disk with W2k Server or Advanced Server to acquire root (admin) permissions - unless you do a full install. (I not talking about just being able to puruse the data on the disk I am talking about being able to serreptitiously act as the administrator -- by using a simple boot or rescue disk.) If you know how to do this I am certainly willing to listen.
You may be right, I don't know. You'd have to go to a windows discussion forum for that. BUT it's not because windows is in any way more secure, it looks like the guys in Redmond want to earn a few $$$ on what is in the *nix world (NB! ANY *nix dialect, including ALL versions of RedHat, ALL versions of *BSD) a routine procedure
http://www.lostpassword.com/windows-xp-2000-nt.htm
//Anders
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* Lee Mavrogenis (leemav@attbi.com) [020714 16:02]: ::Nevertheless (and here is where I respectfully disagree) I still think that ::with respect to a rescue/boot disk unless the root password is actually ::known it should not be allowed to be "reset" under any circumstances. Again ::this is an opinion. The down side is that if you forget the root password ::you will need to reinstall the OS--I think that is appropriate. Yes, but this is possible with every OS. I wish I could express how often our developers forget their root passwds and user passwds on their Sun boxes..it would make your head spin. It's as easy as this to get into a Sun box if you have physical access.... 1. stop + a then boot cdrom -s 2. Once booted you do this 'mount -o rw /dev/dsk/c0t0d0s0 /a 3. vi /a/etc/passwd As Emeril would say *BAM* the box is rooted. ;) If you have physical access...heck even if you don't. If the boxes are on terminal servers if you get access to the machine that's the admin for the terminal servers you've got root on every box on that terminal server. :) Heck I have a boot disk with a Linux kernel that has NTFS support built in and I can boot any WinNT and Win2K server and reset the admin passwd. It's damn easy. *laugh* A server is as secure as the air between the keyboard and their made it..and 8-10 times they will miss something. :) Remember I'm not digging on you..just letting you know that the SuSE rescue system isn't anymore of a security risk that any other..it's actually saved my butt a few times. :) Cheers! -=Ben --=====-----=====-- mailto:ben@whack.org --=====-- Tell me what you believe..I tell you what you should see. -DP --=====-----=====--
On Mon, 2002-07-15 at 03:15, Ben Rosenberg wrote:
Yes, but this is possible with every OS. I wish I could express how often our developers forget their root passwds and user passwds on their Sun boxes..it would make your head spin. It's as easy as this to get into a Sun box if you have physical access....
1. stop + a then boot cdrom -s
or ctrl + break with a non-Sun keyboard
2. Once booted you do this 'mount -o rw /dev/dsk/c0t0d0s0 /a 3. vi /a/etc/passwd
correction!!: 3. vi /a/etc/shadow "null" the second field of the root entry cheers, Marcel
Lee Mavrogenis wrote:
As far as root access from a boot/rescue disk (again, this being in context to the original posted complaint) - within that strict context I am not aware of being able use a boot disk with W2k Server or Advanced Server to acquire root (admin) permissions - unless you do a full install. (I not talking about just being able to puruse the data on the disk I am talking about being able to serreptitiously act as the administrator -- by using a simple boot or rescue disk.) If you know how to do this I am certainly willing to listen.
Thought you might be interested in the following product. http://www.winternals.com/products/repairandrecovery/erdcommander2002.asp One of its key features is that it boots directly from CD and includes the Locksmith utility to reset lost Administrator passwords. Where there's a will there's a way :-) -- Simon Oliver
On Sat, 13 Jul 2002 11:02:22 -0400
Lee Mavrogenis
Well boys and girls it appears I have touched a nerve.
Granted, almost without exception any security scheme can be breached--however thats no excuse to give everyone a key to the front door.
Yeah, you can only build walls, it depends on how high you want those walls to be. Some people prefer to "trust in God".
From what I've read, the really secure computers are in a Faraday Cage, running on independent power, inside a windowless cement room, with an armed guard at the door, under constant video surveillance. Then you need to compile all your apps from source code, with a bunch of geeks scrutinizing all the code for holes. You probably also need to rip apart a few of the processors to make sure that no "secret registers exist in it".
I've also read somewhere that some obscure telecommunications law makes it illegal for Americans to build Faraday Cages for their computers.....it makes me wonder............. -- use Perl; #powerful programmable prestidigitation
On Saturday 13 July 2002 17.37, zentara wrote:
Then you need to compile all your apps from source code, with a bunch of geeks scrutinizing all the code for holes. You probably also need to rip apart a few of the processors to make sure that no "secret registers exist in it".
Don't forget you'd also need to write the compiler yourself from scratch to be absolutely certain. Remember what Ken Thompson did http://www.acm.org/classics/sep95/ //Anders
I don't particually want to get dragged into this largely pointless flame
war except to say :
Why bother with the hassel of a boot disk, if u have physical console access
to the machine, just boot it to runlevel 1 thereby booting to a root prompt.
That way, presumably you'd have the approphiate encryption keys, so you'd be
able to read the disk, and before anyone asks, I personally have done this
several times in SuSE various versions, Redhat 7.2, and Debian.
Kind regards,
Paul Miles
Low cost web and domain hosting at www.allsecuredomain.com
----- Original Message -----
From: "Anders Johansson"
On Saturday 13 July 2002 17.37, zentara wrote:
Then you need to compile all your apps from source code, with a bunch of geeks scrutinizing all the code for holes. You probably also need to rip apart a few of the processors to make sure that no "secret registers exist in it".
Don't forget you'd also need to write the compiler yourself from scratch to be absolutely certain. Remember what Ken Thompson did
http://www.acm.org/classics/sep95/
//Anders
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On Sunday 14 July 2002 01.53, Paul Miles wrote:
That way, presumably you'd have the approphiate encryption keys, so you'd be able to read the disk,
If there is to be any point to an encrypted file system it would be encrypted with a passphrase. If it is, it won't matter that you're root, you would still have to give the passphrase when the filesystem is mounted. //Anders
Hello, everyone. Firstly, I haven't had chance to wade through the multitude of posts on this topic yet, so my apologies if I repeat what someone else may have said. Pysical security is *critical* if you expect to keep control of your box. Does anyone remember the C2 level of security that NT touted itself as being compliant with ? Do you remember what you had to do to make an NT system compliant ? This list included: Keeping the pysical box in a vault like shielded room to prevent EM emissions being picked up Removing the floppy and CD drives once all the required software was installed Disconnecting the machine from any networks (incl. removal of drivers for NICs and network protocols) Uninstalling the POSIX and OS2 subsystems The list goes on. The linux encrypted file system is not a bad idea since you need the passphrase to access the contents regardless of which user you are. I can't think of a single system that can keep you out if you have unrestricted pysical access to a computer. Linux (not just SuSE) have their rescue CDs. It used to be that if you rebooted the machine into single user mode, it would log straight in as root without requiring a password. I know that at least on SuSE these days, it prompts for the root password even in single user mode. Yet, if I take my SuSE CDs with me, I can boot from them and re-install over the existing system with my new version with my passwords etc, and read anything you have on that machine other than the encrypted file systems. The same goes for any of the MS OSes. NTFS is no deterrent; an NTFSDOS boot disk will allow me to read the files on an NT system, and a Linux based tool will allow me to change the local administrator password on an NTFS system. The only MS boxes this doesn't work on are Domain Controllers (PDC, BDC, AD), as they don't use local users and passwords. I think someone mentioned that aren't NTFS drivers for Linux. This is wrong. They may only be safe to use in read-only mode, but that might be all I need to access some vital info from a machine. And since they are unsafe to use to write with, I may choose to write some arbitrary data to an NTFS partition simply to render it useless. Security breaches may not always be to gain useful info. Sometimes they might be for mischief, or just to bring about some denial of service. If I can boot my trusty DOS diskette with FDISK on it on your machine, and wipe the hard drives, that's going to be a big headache for you isn't it ? Yet to achieve the same thing across the network would take a lot more work. Anyone who thinks pysical security is not important is deluding themselves. Do you lock the doors and windows in your house when you leave ? Do you leave valuables on the back seat of your car when you leave it unattended ? Do you padlock your luggage when you travel ? These are all basic pysical security measures we take in our daily lives. Why should we then consider the pysical security of our computer systems, especially critical systems in the business world, to be any less important ? Thanks for listening, Stuart. <snip> On Sunday 14 July 2002 01.53, Paul Miles wrote:
That way, presumably you'd have the approphiate encryption keys, so you'd be able to read the disk,
If there is to be any point to an encrypted file system it would be encrypted with a passphrase. If it is, it won't matter that you're root, you would still have to give the passphrase when the filesystem is mounted. </snip>
** Reply to message from "Stuart Powell"
From what I have seen, the driver is merely for accessing an existing NTFS partition. Linux doesn't use NTFS natively, since it already has a plethora of superior file systems to choose from.
Your question isn't specific enough to know if you want to: a. Create an NTFS partition from within Linux b. Change an existing NTFS partition to something else that Linux can use Answers: a. Not that I've ever heard of, but that doesn't mean it won't ever happen b. fdisk and the like should be able to do that with no problems, but you would lose whatever is currently on that partition Your timing is fortuitous, as I have just made my laptop dual boot between W2K and SuSE8.0, with NTFS and ReiserFS respectively. While I have no illusions that I will ever be able to read the ReiserFS partition from W2K, I am confident that I'll be able to read the NTFS partition from the Linux side should I choose to do so. Bye for now, Stuart. -----Original Message----- From: tabanna [mailto:tabanna@aig.forthnet.gr] Sent: Sunday, July 14, 2002 00:38 To: SuSE List Subject: Re: [SLE] Re: security hole? On Saturday 13 July 2002 11:43 pm, jfweber@eternal.net wrote:
NTFS partition
is there a Linux utility to Format a NTFS Partition, please ? thanks <snip>
On Sunday 14 July 2002 10:38, Stuart Powell wrote:
From what I have seen, the driver is merely for accessing an existing NTFS partition. Linux doesn't use NTFS natively, since it already has a plethora of superior file systems to choose from.
Your question isn't specific enough to know if you want to: a. Create an NTFS partition from within Linux b. Change an existing NTFS partition to something else that Linux can use
Answers: a. Not that I've ever heard of, but that doesn't mean it won't ever happen Preferably, software to do that would accept options such as NT/2K/XP, NTFS4/NTFS5 (and more), and know details which might even violate Microsoft non-disclosure terms. Microsoft could make NTFS a superior file system for inter-operation between their OS and linux; evidently they have reasons for not doing so. b. fdisk and the like should be able to do that with no problems, but you would lose whatever is currently on that partition
Your timing is fortuitous, as I have just made my laptop dual boot between W2K and SuSE8.0, with NTFS and ReiserFS respectively. While I have no illusions that I will ever be able to read the ReiserFS partition from W2K, I am confident that I'll be able to read the NTFS partition from the Linux side should I choose to do so.
Bye for now, Stuart.
-----Original Message----- From: tabanna [mailto:tabanna@aig.forthnet.gr] Sent: Sunday, July 14, 2002 00:38 To: SuSE List Subject: Re: [SLE] Re: security hole?
On Saturday 13 July 2002 11:43 pm, jfweber@eternal.net wrote:
NTFS partition
______________
is there a Linux utility to Format a NTFS Partition, please ?
thanks <snip>
-- Tim Prince
On Sat, Jul 13, 2002 at 12:20:06PM -0500, stuart@yorkshirepudding.com wrote:
I think someone mentioned that aren't NTFS drivers for Linux.
That was me.
This is wrong. They may only be safe to use in read-only mode, but that might be all I need to access some vital info from a machine.
I thought that might be the case (I knew there were read-only drivers, but AIUI, they are only in the "experimental" phase, and the read-write drivers are almost certainly not production-worthy), but it was suitable to illustrate the point. The claim was that booting from a rescue disk and then having read-write access to every file was not possible on NT. My point was that - *If* this claim were true, then it's only because a driver hasn't been written yet, and if the driver hasn't been written, it's only because M$ are not releasing the specs for a relatively complicated FS, and therefore the job is more difficult - not because there's anything particularly secure about the way they've implemented the FS. This is security through obscurity (an obscure FS implementation, or at least more obscure than an open standard like ext2) which is no security at all. I believe there is some kind of extra security built in to NTFS, allowing more fine-grained control over access lists; however, this is only effective when the system honours the control data stored on the disk - simply write your own driver that ignores the access control stuff, and you're in. The same is true with editing config files - for example, with Linux, you can remove the root password by booting with a rescue disk and editing /etc/shadow or /etc/passwd with a text editor, whereas Windoze passwords are probably held in some obscure part of the registry, which is so complicated it needs a GUI tool to edit it, which in turn requires you to have a complete session of Windoze running (which is not possible from a boot disk). Just because the data format is a bit more obtuse doesn't make it any more secure. (note that I don't use Windoze, so some of my statements may be wrong...) Anyway, this has very little to do with SuSE, so I'll stop posting on this topic. -- David Smith | Tel: +44 (0)1454 462380 Home: +44 (0)1454 616963 STMicroelectronics | Fax: +44 (0)1454 617910 Mobile: +44 (0)7932 642724 1000 Aztec West | TINA: 065 2380 Almondsbury | Work Email: Dave.Smith@st.com BRISTOL, BS32 4SQ | Home Email: David.Smith@ds-electronics.co.uk
On Sat, Jul 13, 2002 at 11:02:22AM -0400, leemav@attbi.com wrote: [snip]
Nevertheless, if you need an OS which treats root access a littlie more securely consider alternatives such as Redhat or FreeBSD. If you "forget" you root password you cannot merely insert a "resue disk" (a so neither can anyone else) and break in as root.
I've not used RH for a while, but unless they've made some major changes, that statement is utter rubbish. I don't think that RH encrypts /etc by default (like SuSE), so it would be just as open to the same sort of attack. In fact, I think that RH has gone to an ext3 default rather than ReiserFS, so SuSE might have a slight edge, since many (most?) root+boot disks won't have ReiserFS support yet, and ext3 is backwards-compatible to ext2. Perhaps you'd like to provide some evidence to substantiate your claims that RH is better? What stops you from inserting a bootdisk into the machine, rebooting, and mounting the root FS? I doubt that FreeBSD would be any different, but I can't comment on that since I've never used it.
With regard to data visibility--the concern is more then just whether or not someone else can see the data--it is what they can do as root which might breach the security of your network long after the initial breach.
Unless you encrypt the filesystem, it will always be open to modification by another self-contained OS which has support for the FS type used. As for networks, every resource should be secured by a password system, which communicates over an encrypted link. If you do this, then booting a different OS won't give you access to any network shares without the appropriate authentication keys/passwords. -- David Smith Work Email: Dave.Smith@st.com STMicroelectronics Home Email: David.Smith@ds-electronics.co.uk Bristol, England
The fact is that if you want any system to be secure from access, it must have no network access and noone must be able to get to the machine [physically or logically]. My cousin works for a part of the government and their main machines are in Faraday cages in concrete windowless buildings with guard, swipecard, code, fingerprint access, plus video cameras all over the place [plus some more things that he can't tell me about <grin> ]all before you can get anywhere near the machine! Even then, one can say it isn't 100% secure as he has access to the machine. You can insert a "rescue" disk to Redhat and mount the fs with no root access as I believe they use ext3 now which is backwardsly compatible with ext2. You can mount an ext3 partition on an ext2 only system - it just doesn't have the journalling. At least SuSE has the option of ResierFS which is less likely to be able to be booted from a "rescue" disk as most rescue disks don't have reiser capabilites [not difficult to include]. The cryptographic file systems will not allow you to mount the partition without the proper passphrase, as root or otherwise, so that offers a better model of security. *NO* machine is 100% secure. You would have to have lots of people scrutinizing the code, even in the compilers, and even then, do you trust those people ;o) Still thats my 0.02 EUR ;o) -- Jon Somewhere between here and inanity.
Nevertheless, if you need an OS which treats root access a littlie more securely consider alternatives such as Redhat or FreeBSD. oh izzat so ? I happened to boot RH 7.3 into single user mode recently and was surprised
On Saturday 13 July 2002 17:02, Lee Mavrogenis wrote: that it did NOT require a password... Not so ? In my opinion that is a matter of physical security, ie. locking drives, doors etc.. Regards Dan
participants (15)
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Anders Johansson -
Ben Rosenberg -
Dan Am -
Dave Smith -
jfweber＠eternal.net -
Lee Mavrogenis -
Marcel Broekman -
Paul Miles -
Praise -
Simon Oliver -
Stuart Powell -
tabanna -
The Purple Tiger -
Tim Prince -
zentara