"Jordan K. Hubbard" wrote:
>
> We got off onto a big tangent about switches and vlans and stuff and I
> learned a number of interesting things, don't get me wrong, but we
> still haven't established any consensus on the trade-offs of enabling
> bpf. This wasn't meant to be a hypothetical discussion, I'm truly
> trying to measure the trade-off between enabling bpf and (by some
> fraction) opening things up to easier attack by sniffers in a
> root-compromise situation vs not having DHCP work properly at all
> after installation.
>
> This is a clear security vs functionality issue and I need to get a
> good feel for which "cause" is ascendent here in knowing which way to
> jump on the matter. Can we now hear the closing arguments from the
> pro and con folks?
I'm a pro folk. Your machine will have to be compromised before bpf
becomes and issue, and once a machine is compromised, it is
compromised. The concept of "reducing damage" is an illusion. That's
like calling finger a security tool.
DHCP is very important nowadays. If anyone wants to delude
themselves, they can very well press the "Yes! I want to delude
myself." button by removing bpf from the kernel.
Besides... is there anyone _seriously_ interested in security using
GENERIC? Not that GENERIC is in any way deficient, but why use a
kitchen-sink kernel?
--
Daniel C. Sobral (8-DCS)
d...@newsguy.com
d...@freebsd.org
- Jordan, God, what's the difference?
- God doesn't belong to the -core.
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