> Executing arbitrary scripts as root is also a potentially major security > hole. Your goal should be to do as little as possible as root (or other > elevated privileges), and with as little flexibility as possible. > > Security is hard, and if you don't understand the issues, you should take a > step back and learn them before attempting to work them. If you get them > wrong, you've just exposed your customers to having their machine attacked.
Yes, this kind of applications should be thought throughoutly. The biggest problem is the replacement of the helper tool - if it is replaced, or an alias is created with the same name in the directory of the calling application for ex, which is pointing to a malicious app, that malicious process will be executed with root privileges instead of a real helper tool which can do anything on the system, remaining invisible. For conspiracy it can launch a genuine "helper tool" after doing bad things. So when your application gets popular (and bad guys find this security hole), it can be and most likely will be exploited. _______________________________________________ Cocoa-dev mailing list ([email protected]) Please do not post admin requests or moderator comments to the list. Contact the moderators at cocoa-dev-admins(at)lists.apple.com Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription: http://lists.apple.com/mailman/options/cocoa-dev/archive%40mail-archive.com This email sent to [email protected]
