On 10/13/05, Phil Boswell phil.boswell@gmail.com wrote:
"Anthony DiPierro" wikispam@inbox.org wrote: [snip]
If sysadmins can do any destructive thing they want, then you haven't created a very secure system.
Pick the most secure version of UNIX you can find.
Log in as root.
Invoke the following: $ rm -r /
If I were at home I'd do just that and it'd accomplish nothing, as I have the immutable flag on the / directory. Yes, this flag could be removed if I really wanted to, but there are ways to set up a system so that it requires physical access to do such a thing. But when we're talking about production boxes in a colo, it shouldn't even be possible to log in as root.
How destructive do you actually want?
(I recall hearing a story of how somebody did this and, having interrupted the process mid-destroy, managed with the help of some friends to resurrect the system because he happened to have a copy of EMACS running (i.e. loaded into memory and not susceptible to instant deletion) and was therefore able to type in various vital system files by reading the hex off another terminal. I wish I could back it up with a URL, but it's the end of my work day here, and I'm going home :-) -- Phil [[en:User:Phil Boswell]]