>
> >
> > Someone noticed that kmail tries (and fails due to access rights) to
> > interpret scripts in mail and wondered about a Linux box being stopped
> > thanks to a scrpt beoing mailed to root. However no MTA worth his
> > salt (and that means sendmail isn't) would accept to send mail to
> > root, only to an alias of it.
>
> I disagree about no "MTA worth his salt," and sendmail certainly DOES
> deliver mail to root.
>
> You can always create an alias yourself.
>
I know it but there will be people who don't know about it, forget
it or perhaps one day a person at RedHat makes a mistake and my alias
file is overwritten with a vanilla one where root is not aliased.
Everything you do as root who is not strictly needed for
administration is a potential security risk be it using the Gimp,
using gcc, or reading mail. Since we cannot exclude the eventuality of
a defective MUA or one with a trojan then an MTA should not accept to
deliver to root. No alias, no delivery. Point. Guns have safetys so
you don't shoot yourself in the foot, software should have safetys
too.
BTW sendmail was designed in a time was designed when the few who used
the Internet were adult, equilibrated people so it was czertainly not
built for being secure. Today there are many people in the Internet
and some of them re not adult, are half crazy or are dishonest. And
we cannot afford allowing inherntly insecure features like allowing
mail delivery to root.
--
Jean Francois Martinez
Project Independence: Linux for the Masses
http://www.independence.seul.org
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