Why such "loose" permissions?

[Aaron Grewell]

I believe the reason is the common use of Linux as a webserver.  Often users
have a folder in their homedir named 'html' or whatever that has their
website in it.  They update their website there, and it shows up in Apache
as http://website/~username through one of Apache's nifty modules.  If the
rights are not at least 775 Apache (typically running as a nonpriveleged
user) cannot read the files and the user's website is unavailable.  So I
think it's basically for historical reasons whose justifications are
questionable on today's internet.  Certainly this should no longer be the
default, and should probably be a configurable option in some GUI somewhere
for those who cannot do it properly by hand.  

-----Original Message-----
From: linux-users-bounces at smtp.linux-sxs.org
[mailto:linux-users-bounces at smtp.linux-sxs.org] On Behalf Of Michael Hipp
Sent: Thursday, December 11, 2003 8:31 AM
To: linux-users at linux-sxs.org
Subject: Re: Why such "loose" permissions?


Net Llama! wrote:
> As for why, i can't say, although i think that's just the default 
> umask that Redhat sets.  You can certainly change it in /etc/profile, 
> or somewhere like that.

I wasn't asking how to fix it, I was attempting to ask why does Red Hat 
set it so loose by default?

Is there some good reason for it? Or is it a (misbegotten) attempt to 
make everything open and easy with minimal regard for security?

Just wondering ...

Michael


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