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Design the system so that you do not need users to escalate to root. Find each use case where a user may want to use sudo and then come up with an alternate way

Design the system so that you do not need users to escalate to root. Find each use case where a user may want to use sudo and then come up with an alternate way to accomplish that action from a regular account.

lupusreal 2y ago
We have that, it's called android. Anybody who finds themselves using sudo is already well off the beaten path, by their own choice. There's nothing wrong with that.
- charcircuit 2y ago
  Doing system updates is not off the beaten path.
  - theamk 2y ago
    And system updates don't need sudo on desktops, it is not 1990's anymore... GUI apps like software-properties-gtk use dbus with polkit auth to upgrade software without any involvement of "sudo" or giving root access to users.
  - lupusreal 2y ago
    Using GNU/Linux at all is. Choosing to use such an operating system and then also choosing to do your updates from a terminal emulator is even further off the beaten path. The beaten path is the defaults. Windows and MacOS particularly.
onli 2y ago
That would just elevate each regular account to be a root account. There is no other way to make things like modifying files directly under / possible, or to change system configurations. You can lock everything down instead, then you have Android, but then you have certainly not enabled everything a user can do with sudo.
- charcircuit 2y ago
  >There is no other way to make things like modifying files directly under / possible It doesn't need to be possible. >change system configurations You can have an settings app to configure the system. >then you have Android Which is much farther ahead than Ubuntu on security. Ubuntu needs to play catch up. >but then you have certainly not enabled everything a user can do with sudo. The goal is not to be able to do everything. The average user doesn't need to be able to do anything. Especially with their regular account.
  - butlike 2y ago
    > The average user doesn't need to be able to do anything.
  - theamk 2y ago
    Sounds like you don't want a Linux system, but rather a Chromebook. Have you seen https://chromeos.google/products/chromeos-flex/ https://chromeos.google/products/chromeos-flex/ ? Install it on your computer and you get Android-like security model, including only verified software and lack of "sudo" or any sort of root access.
    - charcircuit 2y ago
      A Chromebook is a Linux system. My concern is with Ubuntu improving their security posture. Telling Canonical to give up on Ubuntu and switch everyone over to ChromeOS is not something that I predict would work.
zahlman 2y ago
Currently, for any given action, the following possibilities are implemented: * The user may never perform the action (would require sudo, but the user doesn't have sudo rights) * The user may sometimes perform the action (i.e. only after authenticating with sudo) * The user may always perform the action (is always implicitly authenticated) "Being root" is just another name for the last option. What fourth alternative do you have in mind?
- charcircuit 2y ago
  >"Being root" is just another name for the last option. No, it's not. Take for example ping. If we want users to be able to always be able to use ping does that mean they need to be root? No, it doesn't. A privileged part of the OS can handle doing the raw socket and the unpriviledged user can talk to that part of the OS. The key point is that some operations that require privileges are okay to expose to a user, but giving the user privileges for everything is dangerous.
  - theamk 2y ago
    Examples please? Modern desktop OSes are pretty good at exposing safe operations to users so that no "sudo" is required.

lupusreal 2y ago

We have that, it's called android. Anybody who finds themselves using sudo is already well off the beaten path, by their own choice. There's nothing wrong with that.

charcircuit 2y ago
Doing system updates is not off the beaten path.
- theamk 2y ago
  And system updates don't need sudo on desktops, it is not 1990's anymore... GUI apps like software-properties-gtk use dbus with polkit auth to upgrade software without any involvement of "sudo" or giving root access to users.
- lupusreal 2y ago
  Using GNU/Linux at all is. Choosing to use such an operating system and then also choosing to do your updates from a terminal emulator is even further off the beaten path. The beaten path is the defaults. Windows and MacOS particularly.

onli 2y ago

That would just elevate each regular account to be a root account. There is no other way to make things like modifying files directly under / possible, or to change system configurations. You can lock everything down instead, then you have Android, but then you have certainly not enabled everything a user can do with sudo.

charcircuit 2y ago
>There is no other way to make things like modifying files directly under / possible It doesn't need to be possible. >change system configurations You can have an settings app to configure the system. >then you have Android Which is much farther ahead than Ubuntu on security. Ubuntu needs to play catch up. >but then you have certainly not enabled everything a user can do with sudo. The goal is not to be able to do everything. The average user doesn't need to be able to do anything. Especially with their regular account.
- butlike 2y ago
  > The average user doesn't need to be able to do anything.
- theamk 2y ago
  Sounds like you don't want a Linux system, but rather a Chromebook. Have you seen https://chromeos.google/products/chromeos-flex/ https://chromeos.google/products/chromeos-flex/ ? Install it on your computer and you get Android-like security model, including only verified software and lack of "sudo" or any sort of root access.
  - charcircuit 2y ago
    A Chromebook is a Linux system. My concern is with Ubuntu improving their security posture. Telling Canonical to give up on Ubuntu and switch everyone over to ChromeOS is not something that I predict would work.

zahlman 2y ago

Currently, for any given action, the following possibilities are implemented: * The user may never perform the action (would require sudo, but the user doesn't have sudo rights) * The user may sometimes perform the action (i.e. only after authenticating with sudo) * The user may always perform the action (is always implicitly authenticated) "Being root" is just another name for the last option. What fourth alternative do you have in mind?

charcircuit 2y ago
>"Being root" is just another name for the last option. No, it's not. Take for example ping. If we want users to be able to always be able to use ping does that mean they need to be root? No, it doesn't. A privileged part of the OS can handle doing the raw socket and the unpriviledged user can talk to that part of the OS. The key point is that some operations that require privileges are okay to expose to a user, but giving the user privileges for everything is dangerous.
- theamk 2y ago
  Examples please? Modern desktop OSes are pretty good at exposing safe operations to users so that no "sudo" is required.