Path: utzoo!yunexus!ists!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!ucsd!ucbvax!mindcrf.UUCP!karish From: karish@mindcrf.UUCP Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions Subject: Re: How secure is UNIX? Summary: FTP and permissions Message-ID: <9005300024.AA18752@mindcrf.mindcraft.com> Date: 30 May 90 00:24:34 GMT Article-I.D.: mindcrf.9005300024.AA18752 References: <100928@<1990May23> <9000030@m.cs.uiuc.edu> <1990May28.102235.10021@agate.berkeley.edu> <6365@amelia.nas.nasa.gov> <1990May29.022854.22733@smsc.sony.com> Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Organization: Mindcraft, Inc. Lines: 24 In article montanaro@crdgw1.ge.com (Skip Montanaro) writes: >Shouldn't the ftp daemon on the receiving end set the file permissions >pessimistically? On Suns at least, the mode on the receiving end is 666. >(Ultrix appears to set the mode to 644, which for the current discussion is >no better than 666.) If the modes are going to be mangled, I'd rather they >were mangled to 600. The case of ~/.netrc is just one problem. As another >example, mail files often contain sensitive information (like passwords :-). >Having them created mode 666 can be just as damaging. The receiving-end ftp daemon should set file access modes using the system's default umask. If a file contains sensitive data, it should be restored into a directory with secure access modes and kept there until the file's access modes can be corrected. This is all under the control of the user. If you want a more user-friendly utility for this purpose, use 'rcp', which preserves modes. -- Chuck Karish karish@mindcraft.com Mindcraft, Inc. (415) 323-9000