Subject: Re: CVS commit: basesrc/bin/ksh
To: None <tech-userlevel@netbsd.org>
From: der Mouse <mouse@Rodents.Montreal.QC.CA>
List: tech-userlevel
Date: 09/27/2002 08:17:43
>>> there already is user with uid=0 and /bin/sh as a login shell.
>> That's a security hole and a proverbial PITA.
> toor has a, "don't use me," password.  So how is a security *hole*.

Because not all ways of getting a user to run something require a
password.  Waving them all away with "but you have to have root access
first" ignores the reality that quite often, a bug may permit, say,
creating a new crontab file but nothing else.  Having toor around makes
it that much easier to leverage such restricted bugs into full access.

*That* is the sense in which it's a security hole.  Whether that's a
large enough one to justify removing it is, of course, another
question.

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