[lug] Re: linux

[D. Stimits]

"Dhruva B. Reddy" wrote:
> 
> So basically, as long as you have physical access to the machine, there is a way
> to reset the root password?  Sounds scary.  Is it possible to do this remotely?
> That's even more scary.

How would you insert the boot floppy remotely? Some popular remote
exploits though try to NFS mount your partition, and find a suid root
app on the partition, which isn't too far off from a boot floppy. NFS is
scary if not closely guarded.

A lot of modern BIOSes allow you to set a password as well that is
mandatory before changing the BIOS or boot records; and lilo can be set
to require a password. If you combine that with setting your BIOS boot
order to not check floppy or CD for bootable media, you're set. Should
you forget your pass to BIOS, you have to remove the battery and let
your BIOS die (reset).

D. Stimits, stimits at idcomm.com

> 
> On Tue, Jun 19, 2001 at 09:01:05AM -0600, J. Wayde Allen wrote:
> > On Mon, 18 Jun 2001, Danny Xavier wrote:
> >
> > > I went to your linux site and found the content very
> > > beautifully explained.I am using suse linux and would
> > > like to know how to change the root password as I have
> > > forgotten it.
> > > There is no floppy drive on my machine
> >
> > Hmmm ... forgetting the root password would tend to make things just a bit
> > tricky since that means you won't be able to gain root priviledges.  You
> > do have physical access to the machine though, so the thing that comes to
> > mind would be to power it down, and load a rescue or install disk.  Since
> > you say you don't have a floppy I'm guessing that means you have a CDROM?
> >
> > The idea would be to load a file system such as done for the system
> > install that is not password protected.  You can often use your install
> > disk this way, just switch to a different virtual console or kill the
> > installation program.  You could then try to manually mount the disk
> > partition containing your password file and null out the root password
> > field.  If you get that far, rebooting the installed system should allow
> > you root access with no password.  You should then be able to change the
> > password to what you want it to be.
> >
> > I'll crosspost this to the BLUG list in case someone has a better way.
> >
> > - Wayde
> >   (wallen at its.bldrdoc.gov)
> >
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