Linda MacPhee-Cobb wrote:
> Hi All,
>
> I have been painstakingly going through the lilo documentation. I have
> not found in the documentation, on my computer or at sunsite, a single
> reference to this back door into my computer. It is not even documented
> in the source code.
What keywords are you looking for?
> The fact we have a back door that allows root access that is
> undocumented is something I would expect from M$ not linux.
>
> Why isn't this documented in an easy to find location? That is very
> troubling. Especially since linux users scream bloody murder when back
> doors are found in Windows.
I found it looking in 'apropos boot' then 'man bootparam' in less than
five minutes. Look for 'single user mode'.
It'll also be found under 'runlevels', possibly in 'apropos password'.
> If I wanted a computer OS that didn't need a password I would use
> Windows 95. One of the reasons for choosing linux was the security.
> Right now Win2000 looks like a better option. The only way to boot this
> machine is from the hard drive. I am not so stupid as to forget root
> password, nor am I pleased that the people writing this system appear to
> have set it up for fools.
See, the key for network security is that noone *not at the console*
can boot the machine anyway.
> If there is one undocumented back door there are many.
>
> Who are these back doors built in for? Clearly not the users or there
> would be documentation.
It *is* documented. I'm sure it's in any of the O'Reilly Linux
sysadmin books. It's in the man pages.
Here's a suggestion: don't look for conspiracy when complacency,
ignorance or apathy are better answers.
It just never *occured* to me that other people wouldn't know this
existed. I can hardly be the only one.
Jenn V.
--
"Do you ever wonder if there's a whole section of geek culture
you miss out on by being a geek?" - Dancer.
[EMAIL PROTECTED] Jenn Vesperman http://www.simegen.com/~jenn/
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