Concern about logging in as root overrated?

Question

For personal linux on my personal notebooks, I've usually set my environment to autologin as root even under X or lower runlevels. I've found my workflow is very pleasant and fast, without any cumbersome need to type su or sudo or being asked by keyring or auth or something.

So far I've never had any problem with it, so why are most people freaking out about it? Is the concern overrated? Of course this assumes the user knows what they are doing and doesn't really care about system reliability and security issues.

Answer 1

For the same reasons why each daemon should have minimal rights. Apache can run as root. It is designed to perform one task and surely nothing bad can happen?

But assume apache is not bug-free. Bugs are discovered from time to time. Sometimes it can even be arbitrary code execution or similar. Now with apache running as root, it can access anything — for example it can load a rootkit into kernel and hide itself.

On the other hand, writing a user-level rootkit is very hard. It has to override different programs (like ps) inside /home, which can raise suspicion due to the extra disk space used. It might not know the exact configuration and forget to include e.g. gnome-system-monitor therefore exposing itself. It has to cover bash, tcsh and any shell you happen to use (to start itself). It would have to work with different configurations instead of 'simply' overriding a bunch of callbacks.

Consider that not so long ago there was arbitrary code execution discovered in... Adobe Reader.

Other reason is user mistakes. It is better to be warned before erasing the whole disk by one command.

Third reason is different shells. Root shell should be installed on / in case that rescue of system needed to be performed. Users' shells can be installed on /usr (for example user can use zsh).

Forth reason is that different programs don't work as root. They specifically know they are not supposed to, so you would need to patch system.

Fifth reason is that /root should not be on a separate partition while /home can (and should). Having /home separate helps for various reasons.

ALSO: WHY NOT USE AS NORMAL USER. You more often don't need to have root rights than do. It is a very little cost for security.

Answer 2

You can also ride a motorcycle in the nude, and nothing may happen. But I bet you'd feel better if you had when you crash the bike...

Answer 3

Apart from the obvious point of security, it is clear you've never hosed your system by mistyping a command in the shell or a lapsus. If it happens, you'll understand why people freak out about it. And then you will cry in horror, and also realize that it was a highly educational experience, but you're not getting your system back anyway.

A thought: if you're being asked for the root password during normal use of your system (ie not installing packages or some other system administration task), you're doing it wrong.

Answer 4

No, it's not overrated. In practice it's most under-appreciated. :-)

My small team at work, for example, is sharing an RHEL machine for development work: building stuff, testing etc. Everyone uses individual user accounts, but we also share the root password since people need this from time to time for quick sysadmin tasks. This also has resulted in us managing to hose the OS a few times in its short lifespan. Someone building a certain version of libc removed the system libc by a silly rm invocation. In another curious incident, the partition table was missing. (Ok, this had nothing to do with privileges.) Rest of the team is blocked until the breakage is fixed. One solution is to have someone volunteer to take up the sysadmin tasks. To this point we have not cared too much, except to allow people to learn their lessons: all of us need some teeth marks on our rear ends, and these are relatively inexpensive teeth marks.

The really curious might want to follow the principle of least privilege, and read Ken Thompson's paper, "Reflections On Trusting Trust." ("The moral is obvious. You can't trust code that you did not totally create yourself.")

Answer 5

Picking up on a comment of yours to another answer

but linux is about freedom, including freedom to destroy your own data, privacy and security

Even forcing people through sudo, Linux offers this freedom. The whole security argument that you want to shun is there to protect you from things are aren't you (read: malicious programs or programs controlled by malicious people).

Think of it as a seatbelt. Takes a second to use. Could save your life from other idiots out there (as well as yourself).

If you don't want to type your password all the time, sudoedit /etc/sudoers but if you keep running as root, one day you're probably going to run something that nukes your system and all your data.

If you're happy knowing that even something as crappy as Flash could reformat your computer, nobody here cares what you do. Run as root.

Answer 6

Why not run Damn Vulnerable Linux as your main system while you're at it. If you're going to ignore system security you might as well ignore all of it...

Answer 7

You're talking about an OS that is the collaborative effort of countless people. If you run nothing but stable software you MAY be safe for a time.

As mentioned before, you would be surprised how small a thing can trash your entire HD. In my first year, I tried running in root alot because, well, back in the days of Fedora-core 3, there weren't as many fancy ways to admin your system from user.

At the time, I made a small xorg edit without backing up, because I didn't think it would hurt. Desktop gone. Then I tried to fix it manually, but couldn't figure out what I'd done, exactly. Later, I thought that maybe I could reinstall my drivers and desktop, but inadvertedly disconnected my ethernet, since it was also nvidia.

While running Arch for the first time, I ignored warnings to create a user and ran as admin for a while. I installed a package from AUR that I needed and after I rebooted, my entire install was busted.

Since I was in root, fixing these problems became a lot worse than they needed to be.

You might conclude I was just incompetent. But as others mentioned... typing "sudo" is a small price to pay for some peace of mind.

EDIT: Oh... and certain programs, like WINE, are expressly not supposed to run in a root environment. http://wiki.winehq.org/FAQ#head-96bebfa287b4288974de0df23351f278b0d41014

Answer 8

Safety reasons - a daemon or script vulnerability targeting Linux would have the Sysadmin power over your system.

Running as a simple user AND using sudo is a lot different in term of security. My Firefox is running as my user, so any Firefox vulnerability will only hit my account. Nothing else.

Answer 9

I agree with Maciej for the concern over security & having control over certain powers. Also, as you are the owner of your system you can disable this functionality if you want ;) it's your choice.

Answer 10

I can't see any great problem logging in as root for a normal session, as long as you don't do anything stupid.

I don't do it personally, because, occasionally I do something silly. I have never noticed that anything stupid I've done has been potentially a big problem, but I am not arrogant enough to think that I'd never do anything really stupid.