From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1161014AbWIGALx (ORCPT ); Wed, 6 Sep 2006 20:11:53 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S1161016AbWIGALx (ORCPT ); Wed, 6 Sep 2006 20:11:53 -0400 Received: from web36607.mail.mud.yahoo.com ([209.191.85.24]:402 "HELO web36607.mail.mud.yahoo.com") by vger.kernel.org with SMTP id S1161014AbWIGALw (ORCPT ); Wed, 6 Sep 2006 20:11:52 -0400 Message-ID: <20060907001151.48122.qmail@web36607.mail.mud.yahoo.com> X-RocketYMMF: rancidfat Date: Wed, 6 Sep 2006 17:11:51 -0700 (PDT) From: Casey Schaufler Reply-To: casey@schaufler-ca.com Subject: Re: patch to make Linux capabilities into something useful (v 0.3.1) To: Linux Kernel mailing-list In-Reply-To: <20060906132623.GA15665@clipper.ens.fr> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7BIT Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org --- David Madore wrote: > ... (one merely needs to do > something about > the new bunch of capabilities I've introduced, but > it should be easy > to hack something which makes sure no programs are > surprised or > broken). You have not introduced new capabilities so much as you've introduced a new layer of policy, that being things that unprivileged processes can do but that "underprivileged" processes cannot. I personally think that this would make a spiffy LSM, but I don't buy it as an extension of the POSIX (draft) capability mechanism. Why? Because the capability mechanism deals with providing controls over the abilty to violate the traditional Unix security policy, as implemented in Linux. Adding "negative" privilege might not be a bad idea, but it is outside the scope of capabilities AND there is a mechanism (LSM) explicity in place for adding such restrictions. Casey Schaufler casey@schaufler-ca.com