Messages in this thread | | | Date | Mon, 21 Feb 2000 18:43:51 +0000 (GMT Standard Time) | From | Paul Jakma <> | Subject | Re: Capabilities |
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On Mon, 21 Feb 2000, Andreas Gruenbacher wrote:
> It all depends on your risk evaluation. Once you gain physical access to a > machine, there's no real protection anymore. If the goal is merely to protect > the system from attacks over the network, switching to trusted mode before the > network interfaces are initializes is perfectly safe. >
not quite...
the problem is that for a period of time the computers will be operating with a completely different security behaviour as compared to it's normal operational behaviour. Assumptions/expections regarding security may not be valid during boot-up, and that's a security risk.
i can't think of something specific, but i am not a security expert. Perhaps someone can, especially considering that Trusted mode security setups are often going to be multi-user boxes with legitimate but potentially hostile interactive users.
IMO if the box boots in traditional unix security mode, then it can not later be considered to be a trusted host.
Either it's installed as Trusted, and then always runs in Trusted mode, or it's not a trusted setup. (not sure, but i think this a requirement for many security certifications like C2 - ie singleuser/allprivs mode is not allowed)
> > Regards, > Andreas
regards,
Paul Jakma.
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