Messages in this thread | | | Date | Wed, 14 May 2003 17:51:34 -0400 (EDT) | From | "Richard B. Johnson" <> | Subject | Re: The disappearing sys_call_table export. |
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On Thu, 15 May 2003, Yoav Weiss wrote:
> > Not so, with the latest Red Hat distribution (9). You can no longer > > set init=/bin/bash at the boot prompt.... well you can set it, but > > then you get an error about killing init. This caused a neighbor > > a lot of trouble when she accidentally put a blank line in the > > top of /etc/passwd. Nobody could log-in. I promised to show her > > how to "break in", but I wasn't able to. I had to take her hard-disk > > to my house, mount it, and fix the password file. All these "attempts" > > at so-called security do is make customers pissed. > > > > 1. Insert Live-System CD (Knoppix for example) > 2. Boot from it. > 3. Mount rootfs. > 4. Fix things. > 5. Remove CD and reboot. >
Not so easy. Many persons have drivers that must be installed using initrd (SCSI, Firewire, etc.) before their root file-systems are accessible.
This means that there isn't a general-purpose tool that you can take with you (except another PC, you can use to mount the locked disk). NotGood(tm). Sun allows their install CD/ROM to be used for repair. Other vendors did this also. New "security" out of Red-Hat seems to prevent this, ALF-F2, etc., used to bring up other virtual terminals. They don't anymore. I think every OS vendor should be required to spend a few weeks in the field, preferably in Afghanistan <grin>, before they even consider mucking with accepted principles.
Cheers, Dick Johnson Penguin : Linux version 2.4.20 on an i686 machine (797.90 BogoMips). Why is the government concerned about the lunatic fringe? Think about it.
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