David Merrill <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> True, security is a lot easier when everything's local.
Agreed.
> If the client accesses the server via ssh and is then logged onto the
> database using their user account on the db machine, where are the
> weaknesses? Where is it vulnerable?
To do this you either have to maintain a local account for each user
on the db machine, or you have to maintain a database-access
username/password for each user. The latter is bad for obvious
reasons. The former has scaling problems, not to mention the problem
that with an account a user could theoreticaly gain additional access
to the server.
>From a security standpoint, you want to limit access as much as
possible. You should not require a login account on a server in order
to use a service on that server machine. Instead, you should
authorize access to the service through a network authentication
system like Kerberos or a PKI.
As I said in my previous email, I'd recommend something like SSL/TLS
to encrypt the session, and potentially for authentication as well
(you could choose to use username/password, Kerberos, or PKI
authetication with SSL/TLS). The other benefit of SSL/TLS is that you
_know_ that you are using security, as well as knowing what level of
security you have.
> I'm not a Linux security expert, although I try to learn as much as I can
> just to stay safe in this wacky world.
Security is very tricky. It's extremely difficult to get it right,
and it's surprisingly simple to get it wrong. One of the first
pitfalls that people fall into is not understanding the ramifications
of the tools they use.
-derek
--
Derek Atkins, SB '93 MIT EE, SM '95 MIT Media Laboratory
Member, MIT Student Information Processing Board (SIPB)
URL: http://web.mit.edu/warlord/ PP-ASEL-IA N1NWH
[EMAIL PROTECTED] PGP key available
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