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Why can 'Others' read files by default in Ubuntu?
up vote
5
down vote
favorite
I am trying to figure out why when creating new files and directories in, let's say, the Documents folder, they get assigned, by default, the following permissions:
-rw-rw-r-- 1 hello world 0 Nov 19 12:17 'New Empty File'
drwxrwxr-x 2 hello world 4.0K Nov 19 12:16 'New Folder'/
Shouldn't 'Others' have no access to my files? From what I've read, Ubuntu is by default pretty secure. However, nowhere could I find a rationalization for this behavior. Would appreciate an answer :)
linux ubuntu
asked yesterday
wombat trash
304
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add a comment |
up vote
5
down vote
favorite
I am trying to figure out why when creating new files and directories in, let's say, the Documents folder, they get assigned, by default, the following permissions:
-rw-rw-r-- 1 hello world 0 Nov 19 12:17 'New Empty File'
drwxrwxr-x 2 hello world 4.0K Nov 19 12:16 'New Folder'/
Shouldn't 'Others' have no access to my files? From what I've read, Ubuntu is by default pretty secure. However, nowhere could I find a rationalization for this behavior. Would appreciate an answer :)
linux ubuntu
asked yesterday
wombat trash
304
New contributor
wombat trash is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
add a comment |
up vote
5
down vote
favorite
up vote
5
down vote
favorite
I am trying to figure out why when creating new files and directories in, let's say, the Documents folder, they get assigned, by default, the following permissions:
-rw-rw-r-- 1 hello world 0 Nov 19 12:17 'New Empty File'
drwxrwxr-x 2 hello world 4.0K Nov 19 12:16 'New Folder'/
Shouldn't 'Others' have no access to my files? From what I've read, Ubuntu is by default pretty secure. However, nowhere could I find a rationalization for this behavior. Would appreciate an answer :)
linux ubuntu
asked yesterday
wombat trash
304
New contributor
wombat trash is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
I am trying to figure out why when creating new files and directories in, let's say, the Documents folder, they get assigned, by default, the following permissions:
-rw-rw-r-- 1 hello world 0 Nov 19 12:17 'New Empty File'
drwxrwxr-x 2 hello world 4.0K Nov 19 12:16 'New Folder'/
Shouldn't 'Others' have no access to my files? From what I've read, Ubuntu is by default pretty secure. However, nowhere could I find a rationalization for this behavior. Would appreciate an answer :)
linux ubuntu
linux ubuntu
asked yesterday
wombat trash
304
New contributor
wombat trash is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
asked yesterday
wombat trash
304
New contributor
wombat trash is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
asked yesterday
wombat trash
304
New contributor
wombat trash is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
asked yesterday
wombat trash
304
asked yesterday
wombat trash
304
304
New contributor
wombat trash is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
New contributor
wombat trash is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
wombat trash is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
add a comment |
add a comment |
2 Answers
2
active
oldest
votes
up vote
13
down vote
accepted
The permissions model of Linux means that, even if you are the only user of your computer, you're not the only user on the system. Many services will create their own user account to run under - for example, Apache will usually run under its own dedicated account.
What you will also notice is that your home folder is usually only accessible to your own account - i.e. permissions 700 or drwx------. That means that only you can get at your home folder, even if subfolders within that folder have full access.
This combination provides a useful balance. The default permissions allow service accounts to read any files on the system that they might need to, but they can't change anything. Any files which are personal to you should be in your home folder, so a rogue service won't be able to access them.
You might find the Filesystem Hierarchy Standard a useful read. This outlines the generally expected permissions and functions for Unix/Linux systems, and most distributions will abide by this.
edited 21 hours ago
wombat trash
304
answered yesterday
timbstoke
24622
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timbstoke is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
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2
For me, onXubuntu 18.04,/home/<home folder>hasdrwxr-xr-xpermissions. Can't then an attacker try to make a user in my group to subvert this rationale?
– wombat trash
yesterday
11
If an attacker has a way to create a user "in your group" you have already lost, cause if he can do that, he can just as easily make one in the "root" group / with root rights.
– Florian Bach
yesterday
2
It might be worth adding a little aboutumaskand how the default permissions for new files can be changed, and the caveats of doing that
– Dezza
yesterday
1
@FlorianBach drwxr-xr-x permissions mean any other users on the system can read the files, not just users in your group. This includes other people with non-admin access user accounts on the system.
– Macil
17 hours ago
As @Macil points out, your home directory is mode 755, NOT 700, on Ubuntu. Anybody who wants to can list and traverse it. While certain subdirectories ("Documents", perhaps) might be 700, files and directories created in ~ are world-readable by default. Since quite a few programs make the same error that you made of assuming the home directory is private, they don't change the mode on their own files and end up emitting potentially-sensitive world-readable data. Ubuntu sucks.
– CBHacking
16 hours ago
add a comment |
up vote
1
down vote
When you create new files and directories, the initial permissions are controlled by your umask setting. The application creating the item specifies the maximum permissions (typically rwxrwxrwx for directories and executable files, rw-rw-rw- for data files), and then the permissions in umask are subtracted from this.
So if you want more restrictive permissions, you should set your umask to remove the permissions you don't want to grant. The permissions you show come from having umask 002, so it just disables other=write. If you want to disable other=read/execute as well, you should used:
umask 007
Traditionally, the default umask 002 comes from the assumption that all the users on a particular system would be a cooperating community (e.g. programmers in the same department of an organization), so there's little reason to prevent other users from reading your files in general. If you have specific files that are more private, you'd give them more restrictive permissions. If the above assumption is inappropriate for the users of your system, you should use a different default umask in the shell startup scripts.
answered 23 hours ago
Barmar
32817
add a comment |
2 Answers
2
active
oldest
votes
2 Answers
2
active
oldest
votes
active
oldest
votes
active
oldest
votes
up vote
13
down vote
accepted
The permissions model of Linux means that, even if you are the only user of your computer, you're not the only user on the system. Many services will create their own user account to run under - for example, Apache will usually run under its own dedicated account.
What you will also notice is that your home folder is usually only accessible to your own account - i.e. permissions 700 or drwx------. That means that only you can get at your home folder, even if subfolders within that folder have full access.
This combination provides a useful balance. The default permissions allow service accounts to read any files on the system that they might need to, but they can't change anything. Any files which are personal to you should be in your home folder, so a rogue service won't be able to access them.
You might find the Filesystem Hierarchy Standard a useful read. This outlines the generally expected permissions and functions for Unix/Linux systems, and most distributions will abide by this.
edited 21 hours ago
wombat trash
304
answered yesterday
timbstoke
24622
New contributor
timbstoke is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
2
For me, onXubuntu 18.04,/home/<home folder>hasdrwxr-xr-xpermissions. Can't then an attacker try to make a user in my group to subvert this rationale?
– wombat trash
yesterday
11
If an attacker has a way to create a user "in your group" you have already lost, cause if he can do that, he can just as easily make one in the "root" group / with root rights.
– Florian Bach
yesterday
2
It might be worth adding a little aboutumaskand how the default permissions for new files can be changed, and the caveats of doing that
– Dezza
yesterday
1
@FlorianBach drwxr-xr-x permissions mean any other users on the system can read the files, not just users in your group. This includes other people with non-admin access user accounts on the system.
– Macil
17 hours ago
As @Macil points out, your home directory is mode 755, NOT 700, on Ubuntu. Anybody who wants to can list and traverse it. While certain subdirectories ("Documents", perhaps) might be 700, files and directories created in ~ are world-readable by default. Since quite a few programs make the same error that you made of assuming the home directory is private, they don't change the mode on their own files and end up emitting potentially-sensitive world-readable data. Ubuntu sucks.
– CBHacking
16 hours ago
add a comment |
up vote
13
down vote
accepted
The permissions model of Linux means that, even if you are the only user of your computer, you're not the only user on the system. Many services will create their own user account to run under - for example, Apache will usually run under its own dedicated account.
What you will also notice is that your home folder is usually only accessible to your own account - i.e. permissions 700 or drwx------. That means that only you can get at your home folder, even if subfolders within that folder have full access.
This combination provides a useful balance. The default permissions allow service accounts to read any files on the system that they might need to, but they can't change anything. Any files which are personal to you should be in your home folder, so a rogue service won't be able to access them.
You might find the Filesystem Hierarchy Standard a useful read. This outlines the generally expected permissions and functions for Unix/Linux systems, and most distributions will abide by this.
edited 21 hours ago
wombat trash
304
answered yesterday
timbstoke
24622
New contributor
timbstoke is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
2
For me, onXubuntu 18.04,/home/<home folder>hasdrwxr-xr-xpermissions. Can't then an attacker try to make a user in my group to subvert this rationale?
– wombat trash
yesterday
11
If an attacker has a way to create a user "in your group" you have already lost, cause if he can do that, he can just as easily make one in the "root" group / with root rights.
– Florian Bach
yesterday
2
It might be worth adding a little aboutumaskand how the default permissions for new files can be changed, and the caveats of doing that
– Dezza
yesterday
1
@FlorianBach drwxr-xr-x permissions mean any other users on the system can read the files, not just users in your group. This includes other people with non-admin access user accounts on the system.
– Macil
17 hours ago
As @Macil points out, your home directory is mode 755, NOT 700, on Ubuntu. Anybody who wants to can list and traverse it. While certain subdirectories ("Documents", perhaps) might be 700, files and directories created in ~ are world-readable by default. Since quite a few programs make the same error that you made of assuming the home directory is private, they don't change the mode on their own files and end up emitting potentially-sensitive world-readable data. Ubuntu sucks.
– CBHacking
16 hours ago
add a comment |
up vote
13
down vote
accepted
up vote
13
down vote
accepted
The permissions model of Linux means that, even if you are the only user of your computer, you're not the only user on the system. Many services will create their own user account to run under - for example, Apache will usually run under its own dedicated account.
What you will also notice is that your home folder is usually only accessible to your own account - i.e. permissions 700 or drwx------. That means that only you can get at your home folder, even if subfolders within that folder have full access.
This combination provides a useful balance. The default permissions allow service accounts to read any files on the system that they might need to, but they can't change anything. Any files which are personal to you should be in your home folder, so a rogue service won't be able to access them.
You might find the Filesystem Hierarchy Standard a useful read. This outlines the generally expected permissions and functions for Unix/Linux systems, and most distributions will abide by this.
edited 21 hours ago
wombat trash
304
answered yesterday
timbstoke
24622
New contributor
timbstoke is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
The permissions model of Linux means that, even if you are the only user of your computer, you're not the only user on the system. Many services will create their own user account to run under - for example, Apache will usually run under its own dedicated account.
What you will also notice is that your home folder is usually only accessible to your own account - i.e. permissions 700 or drwx------. That means that only you can get at your home folder, even if subfolders within that folder have full access.
This combination provides a useful balance. The default permissions allow service accounts to read any files on the system that they might need to, but they can't change anything. Any files which are personal to you should be in your home folder, so a rogue service won't be able to access them.
You might find the Filesystem Hierarchy Standard a useful read. This outlines the generally expected permissions and functions for Unix/Linux systems, and most distributions will abide by this.
edited 21 hours ago
wombat trash
304
answered yesterday
timbstoke
24622
New contributor
timbstoke is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
edited 21 hours ago
wombat trash
304
edited 21 hours ago
wombat trash
304
edited 21 hours ago
wombat trash
304
304
answered yesterday
timbstoke
24622
New contributor
timbstoke is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
answered yesterday
timbstoke
24622
answered yesterday
timbstoke
24622
24622
New contributor
timbstoke is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
New contributor
timbstoke is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
timbstoke is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
2
For me, onXubuntu 18.04,/home/<home folder>hasdrwxr-xr-xpermissions. Can't then an attacker try to make a user in my group to subvert this rationale?
– wombat trash
yesterday
11
If an attacker has a way to create a user "in your group" you have already lost, cause if he can do that, he can just as easily make one in the "root" group / with root rights.
– Florian Bach
yesterday
2
It might be worth adding a little aboutumaskand how the default permissions for new files can be changed, and the caveats of doing that
– Dezza
yesterday
1
@FlorianBach drwxr-xr-x permissions mean any other users on the system can read the files, not just users in your group. This includes other people with non-admin access user accounts on the system.
– Macil
17 hours ago
As @Macil points out, your home directory is mode 755, NOT 700, on Ubuntu. Anybody who wants to can list and traverse it. While certain subdirectories ("Documents", perhaps) might be 700, files and directories created in ~ are world-readable by default. Since quite a few programs make the same error that you made of assuming the home directory is private, they don't change the mode on their own files and end up emitting potentially-sensitive world-readable data. Ubuntu sucks.
– CBHacking
16 hours ago
add a comment |
2
For me, onXubuntu 18.04,/home/<home folder>hasdrwxr-xr-xpermissions. Can't then an attacker try to make a user in my group to subvert this rationale?
– wombat trash
yesterday
11
If an attacker has a way to create a user "in your group" you have already lost, cause if he can do that, he can just as easily make one in the "root" group / with root rights.
– Florian Bach
yesterday
2
It might be worth adding a little aboutumaskand how the default permissions for new files can be changed, and the caveats of doing that
– Dezza
yesterday
1
@FlorianBach drwxr-xr-x permissions mean any other users on the system can read the files, not just users in your group. This includes other people with non-admin access user accounts on the system.
– Macil
17 hours ago
As @Macil points out, your home directory is mode 755, NOT 700, on Ubuntu. Anybody who wants to can list and traverse it. While certain subdirectories ("Documents", perhaps) might be 700, files and directories created in ~ are world-readable by default. Since quite a few programs make the same error that you made of assuming the home directory is private, they don't change the mode on their own files and end up emitting potentially-sensitive world-readable data. Ubuntu sucks.
– CBHacking
16 hours ago
2
2
For me, on
Xubuntu 18.04, /home/<home folder> has drwxr-xr-x permissions. Can't then an attacker try to make a user in my group to subvert this rationale?– wombat trash
yesterday
For me, on
Xubuntu 18.04, /home/<home folder> has drwxr-xr-x permissions. Can't then an attacker try to make a user in my group to subvert this rationale?– wombat trash
yesterday
11
11
If an attacker has a way to create a user "in your group" you have already lost, cause if he can do that, he can just as easily make one in the "root" group / with root rights.
– Florian Bach
yesterday
If an attacker has a way to create a user "in your group" you have already lost, cause if he can do that, he can just as easily make one in the "root" group / with root rights.
– Florian Bach
yesterday
2
2
It might be worth adding a little about
umask and how the default permissions for new files can be changed, and the caveats of doing that– Dezza
yesterday
It might be worth adding a little about
umask and how the default permissions for new files can be changed, and the caveats of doing that– Dezza
yesterday
1
1
@FlorianBach drwxr-xr-x permissions mean any other users on the system can read the files, not just users in your group. This includes other people with non-admin access user accounts on the system.
– Macil
17 hours ago
@FlorianBach drwxr-xr-x permissions mean any other users on the system can read the files, not just users in your group. This includes other people with non-admin access user accounts on the system.
– Macil
17 hours ago
As @Macil points out, your home directory is mode 755, NOT 700, on Ubuntu. Anybody who wants to can list and traverse it. While certain subdirectories ("Documents", perhaps) might be 700, files and directories created in ~ are world-readable by default. Since quite a few programs make the same error that you made of assuming the home directory is private, they don't change the mode on their own files and end up emitting potentially-sensitive world-readable data. Ubuntu sucks.
– CBHacking
16 hours ago
As @Macil points out, your home directory is mode 755, NOT 700, on Ubuntu. Anybody who wants to can list and traverse it. While certain subdirectories ("Documents", perhaps) might be 700, files and directories created in ~ are world-readable by default. Since quite a few programs make the same error that you made of assuming the home directory is private, they don't change the mode on their own files and end up emitting potentially-sensitive world-readable data. Ubuntu sucks.
– CBHacking
16 hours ago
add a comment |
up vote
1
down vote
When you create new files and directories, the initial permissions are controlled by your umask setting. The application creating the item specifies the maximum permissions (typically rwxrwxrwx for directories and executable files, rw-rw-rw- for data files), and then the permissions in umask are subtracted from this.
So if you want more restrictive permissions, you should set your umask to remove the permissions you don't want to grant. The permissions you show come from having umask 002, so it just disables other=write. If you want to disable other=read/execute as well, you should used:
umask 007
Traditionally, the default umask 002 comes from the assumption that all the users on a particular system would be a cooperating community (e.g. programmers in the same department of an organization), so there's little reason to prevent other users from reading your files in general. If you have specific files that are more private, you'd give them more restrictive permissions. If the above assumption is inappropriate for the users of your system, you should use a different default umask in the shell startup scripts.
answered 23 hours ago
Barmar
32817
add a comment |
up vote
1
down vote
When you create new files and directories, the initial permissions are controlled by your umask setting. The application creating the item specifies the maximum permissions (typically rwxrwxrwx for directories and executable files, rw-rw-rw- for data files), and then the permissions in umask are subtracted from this.
So if you want more restrictive permissions, you should set your umask to remove the permissions you don't want to grant. The permissions you show come from having umask 002, so it just disables other=write. If you want to disable other=read/execute as well, you should used:
umask 007
Traditionally, the default umask 002 comes from the assumption that all the users on a particular system would be a cooperating community (e.g. programmers in the same department of an organization), so there's little reason to prevent other users from reading your files in general. If you have specific files that are more private, you'd give them more restrictive permissions. If the above assumption is inappropriate for the users of your system, you should use a different default umask in the shell startup scripts.
answered 23 hours ago
Barmar
32817
add a comment |
up vote
1
down vote
up vote
1
down vote
When you create new files and directories, the initial permissions are controlled by your umask setting. The application creating the item specifies the maximum permissions (typically rwxrwxrwx for directories and executable files, rw-rw-rw- for data files), and then the permissions in umask are subtracted from this.
So if you want more restrictive permissions, you should set your umask to remove the permissions you don't want to grant. The permissions you show come from having umask 002, so it just disables other=write. If you want to disable other=read/execute as well, you should used:
umask 007
Traditionally, the default umask 002 comes from the assumption that all the users on a particular system would be a cooperating community (e.g. programmers in the same department of an organization), so there's little reason to prevent other users from reading your files in general. If you have specific files that are more private, you'd give them more restrictive permissions. If the above assumption is inappropriate for the users of your system, you should use a different default umask in the shell startup scripts.
answered 23 hours ago
Barmar
32817
When you create new files and directories, the initial permissions are controlled by your umask setting. The application creating the item specifies the maximum permissions (typically rwxrwxrwx for directories and executable files, rw-rw-rw- for data files), and then the permissions in umask are subtracted from this.
So if you want more restrictive permissions, you should set your umask to remove the permissions you don't want to grant. The permissions you show come from having umask 002, so it just disables other=write. If you want to disable other=read/execute as well, you should used:
umask 007
Traditionally, the default umask 002 comes from the assumption that all the users on a particular system would be a cooperating community (e.g. programmers in the same department of an organization), so there's little reason to prevent other users from reading your files in general. If you have specific files that are more private, you'd give them more restrictive permissions. If the above assumption is inappropriate for the users of your system, you should use a different default umask in the shell startup scripts.
answered 23 hours ago
Barmar
32817
answered 23 hours ago
Barmar
32817
answered 23 hours ago
Barmar
32817
answered 23 hours ago
Barmar
32817
32817
add a comment |
add a comment |
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wombat trash is a new contributor. Be nice, and check out our Code of Conduct.
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