Dr Andrew Scott G7VAV

MBCS, MIET, Member ACM, Member IEEE

Senior Lecturer
School of Computing
and Communications

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Lancaster University
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PAM_ROOTOK

Section: Linux-PAM Manual (8)
Updated: 06/04/2011
Index Return to Main Contents

NAME

pam_rootok - Gain only root access

SYNOPSIS

pam_rootok.so [debug]

DESCRIPTION

pam_rootok is a PAM module that authenticates the user if their UID is 0. Applications that are created setuid-root generally retain the UID of the user but run with the authority of an enhanced effective-UID. It is the real UID that is checked.

OPTIONS

debug

: Print debug information.

MODULE TYPES PROVIDED

The auth, acct and password module types are provided.

RETURN VALUES

PAM_SUCCESS

: The UID is 0.

PAM_AUTH_ERR

: The UID is not 0.

EXAMPLES

In the case of the su(1) application the historical usage is to permit the superuser to adopt the identity of a lesser user without the use of a password. To obtain this behavior with PAM the following pair of lines are needed for the corresponding entry in the /etc/pam.d/su configuration file:

# su authentication. Root is granted access by default.
auth  sufficient   pam_rootok.so
auth  required     pam_unix.so

AUTHOR

pam_rootok was written by Andrew G. Morgan, <morgan@kernel.org>.

for client (none)

http://www.andrew-scott.uk/

Andrew Scott

http://www.andrew-scott.co.uk/