best way to setup sudo authentication on servers that dont use password?
With sudo, you can either set it to ask for a password or not ask for a password.
Historically, everything was password-protected, which is the model that I am used to. However, encryption seems to be favoring public/private key authentication more and more nowadays.
This is evident in the fact that when I spin up a server on GCP, AWS or DigitalOcean, I dont get a password, instead I get a key that I use to log in. Now, if I want to do sudo when I am logged in, it doesn't ask me for a password. This is obviously due to the fact that a password was never given to me, only a key was. And sudo doesnt ask for a password cause of the following rule in /etc/sudoers.d/90-cloud-init-users
ubuntu ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD:ALL
This is fine for one user. But what happens if a server has 3-4 users, all of whom need sudo access, and all of whom are using keys to log in rather than password. You want to make sure that one user cant do
sudo su - <someone else's username>
sudo <command>
Is the encouraged practice to not allow password authentication when connecting with sshd but to give all the users a password that is used for sudo authentication? Or to use pam_ssh_agent_auth to allow sudo to authenticate with another set of private/public keys that have a passphrase? Or is there something else that should be done.
sudo key-authentication
asked 3 hours ago
modernNeo
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With sudo, you can either set it to ask for a password or not ask for a password.
Historically, everything was password-protected, which is the model that I am used to. However, encryption seems to be favoring public/private key authentication more and more nowadays.
This is evident in the fact that when I spin up a server on GCP, AWS or DigitalOcean, I dont get a password, instead I get a key that I use to log in. Now, if I want to do sudo when I am logged in, it doesn't ask me for a password. This is obviously due to the fact that a password was never given to me, only a key was. And sudo doesnt ask for a password cause of the following rule in /etc/sudoers.d/90-cloud-init-users
ubuntu ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD:ALL
This is fine for one user. But what happens if a server has 3-4 users, all of whom need sudo access, and all of whom are using keys to log in rather than password. You want to make sure that one user cant do
sudo su - <someone else's username>
sudo <command>
Is the encouraged practice to not allow password authentication when connecting with sshd but to give all the users a password that is used for sudo authentication? Or to use pam_ssh_agent_auth to allow sudo to authenticate with another set of private/public keys that have a passphrase? Or is there something else that should be done.
sudo key-authentication
asked 3 hours ago
modernNeo
232
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modernNeo is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
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With sudo, you can either set it to ask for a password or not ask for a password.
Historically, everything was password-protected, which is the model that I am used to. However, encryption seems to be favoring public/private key authentication more and more nowadays.
This is evident in the fact that when I spin up a server on GCP, AWS or DigitalOcean, I dont get a password, instead I get a key that I use to log in. Now, if I want to do sudo when I am logged in, it doesn't ask me for a password. This is obviously due to the fact that a password was never given to me, only a key was. And sudo doesnt ask for a password cause of the following rule in /etc/sudoers.d/90-cloud-init-users
ubuntu ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD:ALL
This is fine for one user. But what happens if a server has 3-4 users, all of whom need sudo access, and all of whom are using keys to log in rather than password. You want to make sure that one user cant do
sudo su - <someone else's username>
sudo <command>
Is the encouraged practice to not allow password authentication when connecting with sshd but to give all the users a password that is used for sudo authentication? Or to use pam_ssh_agent_auth to allow sudo to authenticate with another set of private/public keys that have a passphrase? Or is there something else that should be done.
sudo key-authentication
asked 3 hours ago
modernNeo
232
New contributor
modernNeo is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
With sudo, you can either set it to ask for a password or not ask for a password.
Historically, everything was password-protected, which is the model that I am used to. However, encryption seems to be favoring public/private key authentication more and more nowadays.
This is evident in the fact that when I spin up a server on GCP, AWS or DigitalOcean, I dont get a password, instead I get a key that I use to log in. Now, if I want to do sudo when I am logged in, it doesn't ask me for a password. This is obviously due to the fact that a password was never given to me, only a key was. And sudo doesnt ask for a password cause of the following rule in /etc/sudoers.d/90-cloud-init-users
ubuntu ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD:ALL
This is fine for one user. But what happens if a server has 3-4 users, all of whom need sudo access, and all of whom are using keys to log in rather than password. You want to make sure that one user cant do
sudo su - <someone else's username>
sudo <command>
Is the encouraged practice to not allow password authentication when connecting with sshd but to give all the users a password that is used for sudo authentication? Or to use pam_ssh_agent_auth to allow sudo to authenticate with another set of private/public keys that have a passphrase? Or is there something else that should be done.
sudo key-authentication
sudo key-authentication
asked 3 hours ago
modernNeo
232
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modernNeo is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
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asked 3 hours ago
modernNeo
232
New contributor
modernNeo is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
asked 3 hours ago
modernNeo
232
New contributor
modernNeo is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
asked 3 hours ago
modernNeo
232
asked 3 hours ago
modernNeo
232
232
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Check out our Code of Conduct.
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1 Answer
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Password authentication for access to sudo doesn't restrict what commands can be run.
eg
myuser ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD: ALL
youruser ALL=(ALL) ALL
lets both users run exactly the same commands, just you need to enter your password, and I don't.
Instead the idea is to only grant users the privileged commands they need, rather than "ALL" commands. So if user1 only needs to reboot the server you might give them
user1 ALL=(root) NOPASSWD: /usr/sbin/reboot
Now all they can do is reboot the server.
This follows the principle of least privilege; only give people the commands they need.
Further reading: https://www.sweharris.org/post/2018-08-26-minimal-sudo/
answered 51 mins ago
Stephen Harris
24.6k24477
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Password authentication for access to sudo doesn't restrict what commands can be run.
eg
myuser ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD: ALL
youruser ALL=(ALL) ALL
lets both users run exactly the same commands, just you need to enter your password, and I don't.
Instead the idea is to only grant users the privileged commands they need, rather than "ALL" commands. So if user1 only needs to reboot the server you might give them
user1 ALL=(root) NOPASSWD: /usr/sbin/reboot
Now all they can do is reboot the server.
This follows the principle of least privilege; only give people the commands they need.
Further reading: https://www.sweharris.org/post/2018-08-26-minimal-sudo/
answered 51 mins ago
Stephen Harris
24.6k24477
add a comment |
Password authentication for access to sudo doesn't restrict what commands can be run.
eg
myuser ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD: ALL
youruser ALL=(ALL) ALL
lets both users run exactly the same commands, just you need to enter your password, and I don't.
Instead the idea is to only grant users the privileged commands they need, rather than "ALL" commands. So if user1 only needs to reboot the server you might give them
user1 ALL=(root) NOPASSWD: /usr/sbin/reboot
Now all they can do is reboot the server.
This follows the principle of least privilege; only give people the commands they need.
Further reading: https://www.sweharris.org/post/2018-08-26-minimal-sudo/
answered 51 mins ago
Stephen Harris
24.6k24477
add a comment |
Password authentication for access to sudo doesn't restrict what commands can be run.
eg
myuser ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD: ALL
youruser ALL=(ALL) ALL
lets both users run exactly the same commands, just you need to enter your password, and I don't.
Instead the idea is to only grant users the privileged commands they need, rather than "ALL" commands. So if user1 only needs to reboot the server you might give them
user1 ALL=(root) NOPASSWD: /usr/sbin/reboot
Now all they can do is reboot the server.
This follows the principle of least privilege; only give people the commands they need.
Further reading: https://www.sweharris.org/post/2018-08-26-minimal-sudo/
answered 51 mins ago
Stephen Harris
24.6k24477
Password authentication for access to sudo doesn't restrict what commands can be run.
eg
myuser ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD: ALL
youruser ALL=(ALL) ALL
lets both users run exactly the same commands, just you need to enter your password, and I don't.
Instead the idea is to only grant users the privileged commands they need, rather than "ALL" commands. So if user1 only needs to reboot the server you might give them
user1 ALL=(root) NOPASSWD: /usr/sbin/reboot
Now all they can do is reboot the server.
This follows the principle of least privilege; only give people the commands they need.
Further reading: https://www.sweharris.org/post/2018-08-26-minimal-sudo/
answered 51 mins ago
Stephen Harris
24.6k24477
answered 51 mins ago
Stephen Harris
24.6k24477
answered 51 mins ago
Stephen Harris
24.6k24477
answered 51 mins ago
Stephen Harris
24.6k24477
24.6k24477
add a comment |
add a comment |
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