Configuring Console Access

Disabling Shutdown Via Ctrl-Alt-Del

By default, /etc/inittab specifies that your system is set to shutdown and reboot the system in response to a [Ctrl]-[Alt]-[Del] key combination used at the console. If you'd like to completely disable this ability, you will need to comment out the following line in /etc/inittab:

ca::ctrlaltdel:/sbin/shutdown -t3 -r now

Alternatively, you may just want to allow certain non-root users the right to shutdown the system from the console using [Ctrl]-[Alt]-[Del]. You can restrict this privilege to certain users, by taking the following steps:

1. Add a -a option to the /etc/inittab line shown above, so that it reads:

   ca::ctrlaltdel:/sbin/shutdown -a -t3 -r now

   The -a flag tells shutdown to look for the /etc/shutdown.allow file, which you'll create in the next step.

2. Create a file named shutdown.allow in /etc. The shutdown.allow file should list the usernames of any users who are allowed to shutdown the system using [Ctrl]-[Alt]-[Del]. The format of the /etc/shutdown.allow file is a list of usernames, one per line, like the following:

   stephen jack sophie

According to this example shutdown.allow file, stephen, jack, and sophie are allowed to shutdown the system from the console using [Ctrl]-[Alt]-[Del]. When that key combination is used, the shutdown -a in /etc/inittab checks to see if any of the users in /etc/shutdown.allow (or root) are logged in on a virtual console. If one of them is, the shutdown of the system will continue; if not, an error message will be written to the system console instead.

For more information on shutdown.allow see the shutdown man page.

Disabling Console Program Access

In order to disable access by users to console programs, you should run this command as root:

rm -f /etc/security/console.apps/*

In environments where the console is otherwise secured (BIOS and LILO passwords are set, [Ctrl]-[Alt]-[Delete] is disabled, the power and reset switches are disabled, and so forth), you may not want to allow any user at the console to run poweroff, halt, and reboot, which are accessible from the console by default.

To remove these abilities, run the following commands as root:

rm -f /etc/security/console.apps/poweroff
rm -f /etc/security/console.apps/halt
rm -f /etc/security/console.apps/reboot

Disabling All Console Access

The PAM pam_console.so module manages console file permissions and authentication. (See Chapter 8 for more information on configuring PAM.) If you want to disable all console access, including program and file access, comment out all lines that refer to pam_console.so in the /etc/pam.d directory. The following script will do the trick:

cd /etc/pam.d
for i in * ; do
sed '/[^#].*pam_console.so/s/^/#/' < $i > foo && mv foo $i
done

Defining the Console

The pam_console.so module uses the /etc/security/console.perms file to determine the permissions for users at the system console. The syntax of the file is very flexible; you can edit the file so that these instructions no longer apply. However, the default file has a line that looks like this:

 <console>=tty[0-9][0-9]* :[0-9]\.[0-9] :[0-9]

When users log in, they are attached to some sort of named terminal, either an X server with a name like :0 or mymachine.example.com:1.0 or a device like /dev/ttyS0 or /dev/pts/2. The default is to define that local virtual consoles and local X servers are considered local, but if you want to consider the serial terminal next to you on port /dev/ttyS1 to also be local, you can change that line to read:

<console>=tty[0-9][0-9]* :[0-9]\.[0-9] :[0-9] /dev/ttyS1

Making Files Accessible From the Console

In /etc/security/console.perms, there is a section with lines like:

<floppy>=/dev/fd[0-1]* \
    /dev/floppy/*
<sound>=/dev/dsp* /dev/audio* /dev/midi* \
    /dev/mixer* /dev/sequencer \
    /dev/sound/*
<cdrom>=/dev/cdrom* /dev/cdwriter*

You can add your own lines to this section, if necessary. Make sure that any lines you add refer to the appropriate device. For example, you could add the following line:

<scanner>=/dev/sga

(Of course, make sure that /dev/sga is really your scanner and not, say, your hard drive.)

That's the first step. The second step is to define what is done with those files. Look in the last section of /etc/security/console.perms for lines similar to:

<console> 0660 <floppy> 0660 root.floppy
<console> 0600 <sound>  0640 root
<console> 0600 <cdrom>  0600 root.disk

and add a line like:

<console> 0600 <scanner> 0600 root

Then, when you log in at the console, you will be given ownership of the /dev/sga device and the permissions will be 0600 (readable and writable by you only). When you log out, the device will be owned by root and still have 0600 (now: readable and writable by root only) permissions.

Enabling Console Access for Other Applications

If you wish to make other applications accessible to console users, you will have to do just a little bit more work.

First of all, console access only works for applications which reside in /sbin or /usr/sbin, so the application that you wish to run must be there. After verifying that, do the following steps:

1. Create a link from the name of your application, such as our sample foo program, to the /usr/bin/consolehelper application:

   cd /usr/bin ln -s consolehelper foo

2. Create the file /etc/security/console.apps/foo:

   touch /etc/security/console.apps/foo

3. Create a PAM configuration file for the foo service in /etc/pam.d/. An easy way to do this is to start with a copy of the halt service's PAM configuration file, and then modify the file if you want to change the behavior:

   cp /etc/pam.d/halt /etc/pam.d/foo

Now, when you run /usr/bin/foo, it will call consolehelper, which will authenticate the user with the help of /usr/sbin/userhelper. To authenticate the user, consolehelper will ask for the user's password if /etc/pam.d/foo is a copy of /etc/pam.d/halt (otherwise, it will do precisely what is specified in /etc/pam.d/foo) and then run /usr/sbin/foo with root permissions.