SUDOERS(5) MAINTENANCE COMMANDS SUDOERS(5)
NAME
sudoers - list of which users may execute what
DESCRIPTION
The sudoers file is composed of two types of entries: aliases (basically variables) and user specifi-cations specifications
cations (which specify who may run what).
When multiple entries match for a user, they are applied in order. Where there are conflicting val-ues, values,
ues, the last match is used (which is not necessarily the most specific match).
The sudoers grammar will be described below in Extended Backus-Naur Form (EBNF). Don't despair if
you don't know what EBNF is; it is fairly simple, and the definitions below are annotated.
Quick guide to EBNF
EBNF is a concise and exact way of describing the grammar of a language. Each EBNF definition is
made up of production rules. E.g.,
symbol ::= definition | alternate1 | alternate2 ...
Each production rule references others and thus makes up a grammar for the language. EBNF also con-tains contains
tains the following operators, which many readers will recognize from regular expressions. Do not,
however, confuse them with "wildcard" characters, which have different meanings.
? Means that the preceding symbol (or group of symbols) is optional. That is, it may appear
once or not at all.
* Means that the preceding symbol (or group of symbols) may appear zero or more times.
+ Means that the preceding symbol (or group of symbols) may appear one or more times.
Parentheses may be used to group symbols together. For clarity, we will use single quotes ('') to
designate what is a verbatim character string (as opposed to a symbol name).
Aliases
There are four kinds of aliases: User_Alias, Runas_Alias, Host_Alias and Cmnd_Alias.
Alias ::= 'User_Alias' User_Alias (':' User_Alias)* |
'Runas_Alias' Runas_Alias (':' Runas_Alias)* |
'Host_Alias' Host_Alias (':' Host_Alias)* |
'Cmnd_Alias' Cmnd_Alias (':' Cmnd_Alias)*
User_Alias ::= NAME '=' User_List
Runas_Alias ::= NAME '=' Runas_List
Host_Alias ::= NAME '=' Host_List
Cmnd_Alias ::= NAME '=' Cmnd_List
NAME ::= [A-Z]([A-Z][0-9]_)*
Each alias definition is of the form
Alias_Type NAME = item1, item2, ...
where Alias_Type is one of User_Alias, Runas_Alias, Host_Alias, or Cmnd_Alias. A NAME is a string of
uppercase letters, numbers, and underscore characters ('_'). A NAME must start with an uppercase
letter. It is possible to put several alias definitions of the same type on a single line, joined by
a colon (':'). E.g.,
Alias_Type NAME = item1, item2, item3 : NAME = item4, item5
The definitions of what constitutes a valid alias member follow.
User_List ::= User |
User ',' User_List
User ::= '!'* username |
'!'* '%'group |
'!'* '+'netgroup |
'!'* User_Alias
A User_List is made up of one or more usernames, system groups (prefixed with '%'), netgroups (pre-fixed (prefixed
fixed with '+') and other aliases. Each list item may be prefixed with one or more '!' operators.
An odd number of '!' operators negate the value of the item; an even number just cancel each other
out.
Runas_List ::= Runas_User |
Runas_User ',' Runas_List
Runas_User ::= '!'* username |
'!'* '#'uid |
'!'* '%'group |
'!'* +netgroup |
'!'* Runas_Alias
A Runas_List is similar to a User_List except that it can also contain uids (prefixed with '#') and
instead of User_Aliases it can contain Runas_Aliases. Note that usernames and groups are matched as
strings. In other words, two users (groups) with the same uid (gid) are considered to be distinct.
If you wish to match all usernames with the same uid (e.g. root and toor), you can use a uid instead
(#0 in the example given).
Host_List ::= Host |
Host ',' Host_List
Host ::= '!'* hostname |
'!'* ip_addr |
'!'* network(/netmask)? |
'!'* '+'netgroup |
'!'* Host_Alias
A Host_List is made up of one or more hostnames, IP addresses, network numbers, netgroups (prefixed
with '+') and other aliases. Again, the value of an item may be negated with the '!' operator. If
you do not specify a netmask with a network number, the netmask of the host's ethernet interface(s)
will be used when matching. The netmask may be specified either in dotted quad notation (e.g.
255.255.255.0) or CIDR notation (number of bits, e.g. 24). A hostname may include shell-style wild-cards wildcards
cards (see the Wildcards section below), but unless the hostname command on your machine returns the
fully qualified hostname, you'll need to use the fqdn option for wildcards to be useful.
Cmnd_List ::= Cmnd |
Cmnd ',' Cmnd_List
commandname ::= filename |
filename args |
filename '""'
Cmnd ::= '!'* commandname |
'!'* directory |
'!'* "sudoedit" |
'!'* Cmnd_Alias
A Cmnd_List is a list of one or more commandnames, directories, and other aliases. A commandname is
a fully qualified filename which may include shell-style wildcards (see the Wildcards section below).
A simple filename allows the user to run the command with any arguments he/she wishes. However, you
may also specify command line arguments (including wildcards). Alternately, you can specify "" to
indicate that the command may only be run without command line arguments. A directory is a fully
qualified pathname ending in a '/'. When you specify a directory in a Cmnd_List, the user will be
able to run any file within that directory (but not in any subdirectories therein).
If a Cmnd has associated command line arguments, then the arguments in the Cmnd must match exactly
those given by the user on the command line (or match the wildcards if there are any). Note that the
following characters must be escaped with a '\' if they are used in command arguments: ',', ':', '=',
'\'. The special command "sudoedit" is used to permit a user to run sudo with the -e flag (or as
sudoedit). It may take command line arguments just as a normal command does.
Defaults
Certain configuration options may be changed from their default values at runtime via one or more
Default_Entry lines. These may affect all users on any host, all users on a specific host, a spe-cific specific
cific user, or commands being run as a specific user.
Default_Type ::= 'Defaults' |
'Defaults' '@' Host |
'Defaults' ':' User |
'Defaults' '>' RunasUser
Default_Entry ::= Default_Type Parameter_List
Parameter_List ::= Parameter |
Parameter ',' Parameter_List
Parameter ::= Parameter '=' Value |
Parameter '+=' Value |
Parameter '-=' Value |
'!'* Parameter
Parameters may be flags, integer values, strings, or lists. Flags are implicitly boolean and can be
turned off via the '!' operator. Some integer, string and list parameters may also be used in a
boolean context to disable them. Values may be enclosed in double quotes (") when they contain mul-tiple multiple
tiple words. Special characters may be escaped with a backslash (\).
Lists have two additional assignment operators, += and -=. These operators are used to add to and
delete from a list respectively. It is not an error to use the -= operator to remove an element that
does not exist in a list.
Flags:
long_otp_prompt
When validating with a One Time Password scheme (S/Key or OPIE), a two-line prompt is
used to make it easier to cut and paste the challenge to a local window. It's not as
pretty as the default but some people find it more convenient. This flag is off by
default.
ignore_dot If set, sudo will ignore '.' or '' (current dir) in the PATH environment variable; the
PATH itself is not modified. This flag is off by default. Currently, while it is possi-ble possible
ble to set ignore_dot in sudoers, its value is not used. This option should be consid-ered considered
ered read-only (it will be fixed in a future version of sudo).
mail_always Send mail to the mailto user every time a users runs sudo. This flag is off by default.
mail_badpass
Send mail to the mailto user if the user running sudo does not enter the correct pass-word. password.
word. This flag is off by default.
mail_no_user
If set, mail will be sent to the mailto user if the invoking user is not in the sudoers
file. This flag is on by default.
mail_no_host
If set, mail will be sent to the mailto user if the invoking user exists in the sudoers
file, but is not allowed to run commands on the current host. This flag is off by
default.
mail_no_perms
If set, mail will be sent to the mailto user if the invoking user is allowed to use sudo
but the command they are trying is not listed in their sudoers file entry or is explic-itly explicitly
itly denied. This flag is off by default.
tty_tickets If set, users must authenticate on a per-tty basis. Normally, sudo uses a directory in
the ticket dir with the same name as the user running it. With this flag enabled, sudo
will use a file named for the tty the user is logged in on in that directory. This flag
is off by default.
authenticate
If set, users must authenticate themselves via a password (or other means of authentica-tion) authentication)
tion) before they may run commands. This default may be overridden via the PASSWD and
NOPASSWD tags. This flag is on by default.
root_sudo If set, root is allowed to run sudo too. Disabling this prevents users from "chaining"
sudo commands to get a root shell by doing something like "sudo sudo /bin/sh". Note,
however, that turning off root_sudo will also prevent root and from running sudoedit.
Disabling root_sudo provides no real additional security; it exists purely for historical
reasons. This flag is on by default.
log_host If set, the hostname will be logged in the (non-syslog) sudo log file. This flag is off
by default.
log_year If set, the four-digit year will be logged in the (non-syslog) sudo log file. This flag
is off by default.
shell_noargs
If set and sudo is invoked with no arguments it acts as if the -s flag had been given.
That is, it runs a shell as root (the shell is determined by the SHELL environment vari-able variable
able if it is set, falling back on the shell listed in the invoking user's /etc/passwd
entry if not). This flag is off by default.
set_home If set and sudo is invoked with the -s flag the HOME environment variable will be set to
the home directory of the target user (which is root unless the -u option is used). This
effectively makes the -s flag imply -H. This flag is off by default.
always_set_home
If set, sudo will set the HOME environment variable to the home directory of the target
user (which is root unless the -u option is used). This effectively means that the -H
flag is always implied. This flag is off by default.
path_info Normally, sudo will tell the user when a command could not be found in their PATH envi-ronment environment
ronment variable. Some sites may wish to disable this as it could be used to gather
information on the location of executables that the normal user does not have access to.
The disadvantage is that if the executable is simply not in the user's PATH, sudo will
tell the user that they are not allowed to run it, which can be confusing. This flag is
off by default.
preserve_groups
By default sudo will initialize the group vector to the list of groups the target user is
in. When preserve_groups is set, the user's existing group vector is left unaltered.
The real and effective group IDs, however, are still set to match the target user. This
flag is off by default.
fqdn Set this flag if you want to put fully qualified hostnames in the sudoers file. I.e.,
instead of myhost you would use myhost.mydomain.edu. You may still use the short form if
you wish (and even mix the two). Beware that turning on fqdn requires sudo to make DNS
lookups which may make sudo unusable if DNS stops working (for example if the machine is
not plugged into the network). Also note that you must use the host's official name as
DNS knows it. That is, you may not use a host alias (CNAME entry) due to performance
issues and the fact that there is no way to get all aliases from DNS. If your machine's
hostname (as returned by the hostname command) is already fully qualified you shouldn't
need to set fqdn. This flag is off by default.
insults If set, sudo will insult users when they enter an incorrect password. This flag is off
by default.
requiretty If set, sudo will only run when the user is logged in to a real tty. This will disallow
things like "rsh somehost sudo ls" since rsh(1) does not allocate a tty. Because it is
not possible to turn off echo when there is no tty present, some sites may wish to set
this flag to prevent a user from entering a visible password. This flag is off by
default.
env_editor If set, visudo will use the value of the EDITOR or VISUAL environment variables before
falling back on the default editor list. Note that this may create a security hole as it
allows the user to run any arbitrary command as root without logging. A safer alterna-tive alternative
tive is to place a colon-separated list of editors in the editor variable. visudo will
then only use the EDITOR or VISUAL if they match a value specified in editor. This flag
is on by default.
rootpw If set, sudo will prompt for the root password instead of the password of the invoking
user. This flag is off by default.
runaspw If set, sudo will prompt for the password of the user defined by the runas_default option
(defaults to root) instead of the password of the invoking user. This flag is off by
default.
targetpw If set, sudo will prompt for the password of the user specified by the -u flag (defaults
to root) instead of the password of the invoking user. Note that this precludes the use
of a uid not listed in the passwd database as an argument to the -u flag. This flag is
off by default.
set_logname Normally, sudo will set the LOGNAME and USER environment variables to the name of the
target user (usually root unless the -u flag is given). However, since some programs
(including the RCS revision control system) use LOGNAME to determine the real identity of
the user, it may be desirable to change this behavior. This can be done by negating the
set_logname option.
stay_setuid Normally, when sudo executes a command the real and effective UIDs are set to the target
user (root by default). This option changes that behavior such that the real UID is left
as the invoking user's UID. In other words, this makes sudo act as a setuid wrapper.
This can be useful on systems that disable some potentially dangerous functionality when
a program is run setuid. Note, however, that this means that sudo will run with the real
uid of the invoking user which may allow that user to kill sudo before it can log a fail-ure, failure,
ure, depending on how your OS defines the interaction between signals and setuid pro-cesses. processes.
cesses.
env_reset If set, sudo will reset the environment to only contain the following variables: HOME,
LOGNAME, PATH, SHELL, TERM, and USER (in addition to the SUDO_* variables). Of these,
only TERM is copied unaltered from the old environment. The other variables are set to
default values (possibly modified by the value of the set_logname option). If sudo was
compiled with the SECURE_PATH option, its value will be used for the PATH environment
variable. Other variables may be preserved with the env_keep option.
use_loginclass
If set, sudo will apply the defaults specified for the target user's login class if one
exists. Only available if sudo is configured with the --with-logincap option. This flag
is off by default.
noexec If set, all commands run via sudo will behave as if the NOEXEC tag has been set, unless
overridden by a EXEC tag. See the description of NOEXEC and EXEC below as well as the
"PREVENTING SHELL ESCAPES" section at the end of this manual. This flag is off by
default.
ignore_local_sudoers
If set via LDAP, parsing of @sysconfdir@/sudoers will be skipped. This is intended for
an Enterprises that wish to prevent the usage of local sudoers files so that only LDAP is
used. This thwarts the efforts of rogue operators who would attempt to add roles to
@sysconfdir@/sudoers. When this option is present, @sysconfdir@/sudoers does not even
need to exist. Since this options tells sudo how to behave when no specific LDAP entries
have been matched, this sudoOption is only meaningful for the cn=defaults section. This
flag is off by default.
Integers:
passwd_tries
The number of tries a user gets to enter his/her password before sudo logs the failure
and exits. The default is 3.
Integers that can be used in a boolean context:
loglinelen Number of characters per line for the file log. This value is used to decide when to
wrap lines for nicer log files. This has no effect on the syslog log file, only the file
log. The default is 80 (use 0 or negate the option to disable word wrap).
timestamp_timeout
Number of minutes that can elapse before sudo will ask for a passwd again. The default
is 5. Set this to 0 to always prompt for a password. If set to a value less than 0 the
user's timestamp will never expire. This can be used to allow users to create or delete
their own timestamps via sudo -v and sudo -k respectively.
passwd_timeout
Number of minutes before the sudo password prompt times out. The default is 0, set this
to 0 for no password timeout.
umask Umask to use when running the command. Negate this option or set it to 0777 to preserve
the user's umask. The default is 0022.
Strings:
mailsub Subject of the mail sent to the mailto user. The escape %h will expand to the hostname of
the machine. Default is *** SECURITY information for %h ***.
badpass_message
Message that is displayed if a user enters an incorrect password. The default is Sorry,
try again. unless insults are enabled.
timestampdir
The directory in which sudo stores its timestamp files. The default is /var/db/sudo.
timestampowner
The owner of the timestamp directory and the timestamps stored therein. The default is
root.
passprompt The default prompt to use when asking for a password; can be overridden via the -p option
or the SUDO_PROMPT environment variable. The following percent (`%') escapes are sup-ported: supported:
ported:
%u expanded to the invoking user's login name
%U expanded to the login name of the user the command will be run as (defaults to
root)
%h expanded to the local hostname without the domain name
%H expanded to the local hostname including the domain name (on if the machine's
hostname is fully qualified or the fqdn option is set)
%% two consecutive % characters are collaped into a single % character
The default value is Password:.
runas_default
The default user to run commands as if the -u flag is not specified on the command line.
This defaults to root. Note that if runas_default is set it must occur before any
Runas_Alias specifications.
syslog_goodpri
Syslog priority to use when user authenticates successfully. Defaults to notice.
syslog_badpri
Syslog priority to use when user authenticates unsuccessfully. Defaults to alert.
editor A colon (':') separated list of editors allowed to be used with visudo. visudo will
choose the editor that matches the user's USER environment variable if possible, or the
first editor in the list that exists and is executable. The default is the path to vi on
your system.
noexec_file Path to a shared library containing dummy versions of the execv(), execve() and fexecve()
library functions that just return an error. This is used to implement the noexec func-tionality functionality
tionality on systems that support LD_PRELOAD or its equivalent. Defaults to .
Strings that can be used in a boolean context:
lecture This option controls when a short lecture will be printed along with the password prompt.
It has the following possible values:
never Never lecture the user.
once Only lecture the user the first time they run sudo.
always Always lecture the user.
If no value is specified, a value of once is implied. Negating the option results in a
value of never being used. The default value is once.
lecture_file
Path to a file containing an alternate sudo lecture that will be used in place of the
standard lecture if the named file exists.
logfile Path to the sudo log file (not the syslog log file). Setting a path turns on logging to
a file; negating this option turns it off.
syslog Syslog facility if syslog is being used for logging (negate to disable syslog logging).
Defaults to local2.
mailerpath Path to mail program used to send warning mail. Defaults to the path to sendmail found
at configure time.
mailerflags Flags to use when invoking mailer. Defaults to -t.
mailto Address to send warning and error mail to. The address should be enclosed in double
quotes (") to protect against sudo interpreting the @ sign. Defaults to root.
exempt_group
Users in this group are exempt from password and PATH requirements. This is not set by
default.
verifypw This option controls when a password will be required when a user runs sudo with the -v
flag. It has the following possible values:
all All the user's sudoers entries for the current host must have the NOPASSWD flag
set to avoid entering a password.
any At least one of the user's sudoers entries for the current host must have the
NOPASSWD flag set to avoid entering a password.
never The user need never enter a password to use the -v flag.
always The user must always enter a password to use the -v flag.
If no value is specified, a value of all is implied. Negating the option results in a
value of never being used. The default value is all.
listpw This option controls when a password will be required when a user runs sudo with the -l
flag. It has the following possible values:
all All the user's sudoers entries for the current host must have the NOPASSWD flag
set to avoid entering a password.
any At least one of the user's sudoers entries for the current host must have the
NOPASSWD flag set to avoid entering a password.
never The user need never enter a password to use the -l flag.
always The user must always enter a password to use the -l flag.
If no value is specified, a value of any is implied. Negating the option results in a
value of never being used. The default value is any.
Lists that can be used in a boolean context:
env_check Environment variables to be removed from the user's environment if the variable's value
contains % or / characters. This can be used to guard against printf-style format vul-nerabilities vulnerabilities
nerabilities in poorly-written programs. The argument may be a double-quoted, space-sep-arated space-separated
arated list or a single value without double-quotes. The list can be replaced, added to,
deleted from, or disabled by using the =, +=, -=, and ! operators respectively. The
default list of environment variables to check is printed when sudo is run by root with
the -V option.
env_delete Environment variables to be removed from the user's environment. The argument may be a
double-quoted, space-separated list or a single value without double-quotes. The list
can be replaced, added to, deleted from, or disabled by using the =, +=, -=, and ! opera-tors operators
tors respectively. The default list of environment variables to remove is printed when
sudo is run by root with the -V option. Note that many operating systems will remove
potentially dangerous variables from the environment of any setuid process (such as
sudo).
env_keep Environment variables to be preserved in the user's environment when the env_reset option
is in effect. This allows fine-grained control over the environment sudo-spawned pro-cesses processes
cesses will receive. The argument may be a double-quoted, space-separated list or a sin-gle single
gle value without double-quotes. The list can be replaced, added to, deleted from, or
disabled by using the =, +=, -=, and ! operators respectively. This list has no default
members.
When logging via syslog(3), sudo accepts the following values for the syslog facility (the value of
the syslog Parameter): authpriv (if your OS supports it), auth, daemon, user, local0, local1, local2,
local3, local4, local5, local6, and local7. The following syslog priorities are supported: alert,
crit, debug, emerg, err, info, notice, and warning.
User Specification
User_Spec ::= User_List Host_List '=' Cmnd_Spec_List \
(':' Host_List '=' Cmnd_Spec_List)*
Cmnd_Spec_List ::= Cmnd_Spec |
Cmnd_Spec ',' Cmnd_Spec_List
Cmnd_Spec ::= Runas_Spec? Tag_Spec* Cmnd
Runas_Spec ::= '(' Runas_List ')'
Tag_Spec ::= ('NOPASSWD:' | 'PASSWD:' | 'NOEXEC:' | 'EXEC:')
A user specification determines which commands a user may run (and as what user) on specified hosts.
By default, commands are run as root, but this can be changed on a per-command basis.
Let's break that down into its constituent parts:
Runas_Spec
A Runas_Spec is simply a Runas_List (as defined above) enclosed in a set of parentheses. If you do
not specify a Runas_Spec in the user specification, a default Runas_Spec of root will be used. A
Runas_Spec sets the default for commands that follow it. What this means is that for the entry:
dgb boulder = (operator) /bin/ls, /bin/kill, /usr/bin/lprm
The user dgb may run /bin/ls, /bin/kill, and /usr/bin/lprm -- but only as operator. E.g.,
$ sudo -u operator /bin/ls.
It is also possible to override a Runas_Spec later on in an entry. If we modify the entry like so:
dgb boulder = (operator) /bin/ls, (root) /bin/kill, /usr/bin/lprm
Then user dgb is now allowed to run /bin/ls as operator, but /bin/kill and /usr/bin/lprm as root.
Tag_Spec
A command may have zero or more tags associated with it. There are four possible tag values,
NOPASSWD, PASSWD, NOEXEC, EXEC. Once a tag is set on a Cmnd, subsequent Cmnds in the Cmnd_Spec_List,
inherit the tag unless it is overridden by the opposite tag (ie: PASSWD overrides NOPASSWD and EXEC
overrides NOEXEC).
NOPASSWD and PASSWD
By default, sudo requires that a user authenticate him or herself before running a command. This
behavior can be modified via the NOPASSWD tag. Like a Runas_Spec, the NOPASSWD tag sets a default
for the commands that follow it in the Cmnd_Spec_List. Conversely, the PASSWD tag can be used to
reverse things. For example:
ray rushmore = NOPASSWD: /bin/kill, /bin/ls, /usr/bin/lprm
would allow the user ray to run /bin/kill, /bin/ls, and /usr/bin/lprm as root on the machine rushmore
as root without authenticating himself. If we only want ray to be able to run /bin/kill without a
password the entry would be:
ray rushmore = NOPASSWD: /bin/kill, PASSWD: /bin/ls, /usr/bin/lprm
Note, however, that the PASSWD tag has no effect on users who are in the group specified by the
exempt_group option.
By default, if the NOPASSWD tag is applied to any of the entries for a user on the current host, he
or she will be able to run sudo -l without a password. Additionally, a user may only run sudo -v
without a password if the NOPASSWD tag is present for all a user's entries that pertain to the cur-rent current
rent host. This behavior may be overridden via the verifypw and listpw options.
NOEXEC and EXEC
If sudo has been compiled with noexec support and the underlying operating system support it, the
NOEXEC tag can be used to prevent a dynamically-linked executable from running further commands
itself.
In the following example, user aaron may run /usr/bin/more and /usr/bin/vi but shell escapes will be
disabled.
aaron shanty = NOEXEC: /usr/bin/more, /usr/bin/vi
See the "PREVENTING SHELL ESCAPES" section below for more details on how noexec works and whether or
not it will work on your system.
Wildcards
sudo allows shell-style wildcards (aka meta or glob characters) to be used in pathnames as well as
command line arguments in the sudoers file. Wildcard matching is done via the POSIX fnmatch(3) rou-tine. routine.
tine. Note that these are not regular expressions.
* Matches any set of zero or more characters.
? Matches any single character.
[...] Matches any character in the specified range.
[!...] Matches any character not in the specified range.
\x For any character "x", evaluates to "x". This is used to escape special characters such as:
"*", "?", "[", and "}".
Note that a forward slash ('/') will not be matched by wildcards used in the pathname. When matching
the command line arguments, however, a slash does get matched by wildcards. This is to make a path
like:
/usr/bin/*
match /usr/bin/who but not /usr/bin/X11/xterm.
WARNING: a pathname with wildcards will not match a user command that consists of a relative path.
In other words, given the following sudoers entry:
billy workstation = /usr/bin/*
user billy will be able to run any command in /usr/bin as root, such as /usr/bin/w. The following
two command will be allowed (the first assumes that /usr/bin is in the user's path):
$ sudo w
$ sudo /usr/bin/w
However, this will not:
$ cd /usr/bin
$ sudo ./w
For this reason you should only grant access to commands using wildcards and never restrict access
using them. This limitation will be removed in a future version of sudo.
Exceptions to wildcard rules
The following exceptions apply to the above rules:
"" If the empty string "" is the only command line argument in the sudoers entry it means that
command is not allowed to be run with any arguments.
Other special characters and reserved words
The pound sign ('#') is used to indicate a comment (unless it occurs in the context of a user name
and is followed by one or more digits, in which case it is treated as a uid). Both the comment char-acter character
acter and any text after it, up to the end of the line, are ignored.
The reserved word ALL is a built-in alias that always causes a match to succeed. It can be used
wherever one might otherwise use a Cmnd_Alias, User_Alias, Runas_Alias, or Host_Alias. You should
not try to define your own alias called ALL as the built-in alias will be used in preference to your
own. Please note that using ALL can be dangerous since in a command context, it allows the user to
run any command on the system.
An exclamation point ('!') can be used as a logical not operator both in an alias and in front of a
Cmnd. This allows one to exclude certain values. Note, however, that using a ! in conjunction with
the built-in ALL alias to allow a user to run "all but a few" commands rarely works as intended (see
SECURITY NOTES below).
Long lines can be continued with a backslash ('\') as the last character on the line.
Whitespace between elements in a list as well as special syntactic characters in a User Specification
('=', ':', '(', ')') is optional.
The following characters must be escaped with a backslash ('\') when used as part of a word (e.g. a
username or hostname): '@', '!', '=', ':', ',', '(', ')', '\'.
FILES
/private/etc/sudoers List of who can run what
/etc/group Local groups file
/etc/netgroup List of network groups
EXAMPLES
Since the sudoers file is parsed in a single pass, order is important. In general, you should struc-ture structure
ture sudoers such that the Host_Alias, User_Alias, and Cmnd_Alias specifications come first, followed
by any Default_Entry lines, and finally the Runas_Alias and user specifications. The basic rule of
thumb is you cannot reference an Alias that has not already been defined.
Below are example sudoers entries. Admittedly, some of these are a bit contrived. First, we define
our aliases:
# User alias specification
User_Alias FULLTIMERS = millert, mikef, dowdy
User_Alias PARTTIMERS = bostley, jwfox, crawl
User_Alias WEBMASTERS = will, wendy, wim
# Runas alias specification
Runas_Alias OP = root, operator
Runas_Alias DB = oracle, sybase
# Host alias specification
Host_Alias SPARC = bigtime, eclipse, moet, anchor :\
SGI = grolsch, dandelion, black :\
ALPHA = widget, thalamus, foobar :\
HPPA = boa, nag, python
Host_Alias CUNETS = 128.138.0.0/255.255.0.0
Host_Alias CSNETS = 128.138.243.0, 128.138.204.0/24, 128.138.242.0
Host_Alias SERVERS = master, mail, www, ns
Host_Alias CDROM = orion, perseus, hercules
# Cmnd alias specification
Cmnd_Alias DUMPS = /usr/bin/mt, /usr/sbin/dump, /usr/sbin/rdump,\
/usr/sbin/restore, /usr/sbin/rrestore
Cmnd_Alias KILL = /usr/bin/kill
Cmnd_Alias PRINTING = /usr/sbin/lpc, /usr/bin/lprm
Cmnd_Alias SHUTDOWN = /usr/sbin/shutdown
Cmnd_Alias HALT = /usr/sbin/halt
Cmnd_Alias REBOOT = /usr/sbin/reboot
Cmnd_Alias SHELLS = /usr/bin/sh, /usr/bin/csh, /usr/bin/ksh, \
/usr/local/bin/tcsh, /usr/bin/rsh, \
/usr/local/bin/zsh
Cmnd_Alias SU = /usr/bin/su
Here we override some of the compiled in default values. We want sudo to log via syslog(3) using the
auth facility in all cases. We don't want to subject the full time staff to the sudo lecture, user
millert need not give a password, and we don't want to reset the LOGNAME or USER environment vari-ables variables
ables when running commands as root. Additionally, on the machines in the SERVERS Host_Alias, we
keep an additional local log file and make sure we log the year in each log line since the log
entries will be kept around for several years.
# Override built-in defaults
Defaults syslog=auth
Defaults>root !set_logname
Defaults:FULLTIMERS !lecture
Defaults:millert !authenticate
Defaults@SERVERS log_year, logfile=/var/log/sudo.log
The User specification is the part that actually determines who may run what.
root ALL = (ALL) ALL
%wheel ALL = (ALL) ALL
We let root and any user in group wheel run any command on any host as any user.
FULLTIMERS ALL = NOPASSWD: ALL
Full time sysadmins (millert, mikef, and dowdy) may run any command on any host without authenticat-ing authenticating
ing themselves.
PARTTIMERS ALL = ALL
Part time sysadmins (bostley, jwfox, and crawl) may run any command on any host but they must authen-ticate authenticate
ticate themselves first (since the entry lacks the NOPASSWD tag).
jack CSNETS = ALL
The user jack may run any command on the machines in the CSNETS alias (the networks 128.138.243.0,
128.138.204.0, and 128.138.242.0). Of those networks, only 128.138.204.0 has an explicit netmask (in
CIDR notation) indicating it is a class C network. For the other networks in CSNETS, the local
machine's netmask will be used during matching.
lisa CUNETS = ALL
The user lisa may run any command on any host in the CUNETS alias (the class B network 128.138.0.0).
operator ALL = DUMPS, KILL, SHUTDOWN, HALT, REBOOT, PRINTING,\
sudoedit /etc/printcap, /usr/oper/bin/
The operator user may run commands limited to simple maintenance. Here, those are commands related
to backups, killing processes, the printing system, shutting down the system, and any commands in the
directory /usr/oper/bin/.
joe ALL = /usr/bin/su operator
The user joe may only su(1) to operator.
pete HPPA = /usr/bin/passwd [A-z]*, !/usr/bin/passwd root
The user pete is allowed to change anyone's password except for root on the HPPA machines. Note that
this assumes passwd(1) does not take multiple usernames on the command line.
bob SPARC = (OP) ALL : SGI = (OP) ALL
The user bob may run anything on the SPARC and SGI machines as any user listed in the OP Runas_Alias
(root and operator).
jim +biglab = ALL
The user jim may run any command on machines in the biglab netgroup. Sudo knows that "biglab" is a
netgroup due to the '+' prefix.
+secretaries ALL = PRINTING, /usr/bin/adduser, /usr/bin/rmuser
Users in the secretaries netgroup need to help manage the printers as well as add and remove users,
so they are allowed to run those commands on all machines.
fred ALL = (DB) NOPASSWD: ALL
The user fred can run commands as any user in the DB Runas_Alias (oracle or sybase) without giving a
password.
john ALPHA = /usr/bin/su [!-]*, !/usr/bin/su *root*
On the ALPHA machines, user john may su to anyone except root but he is not allowed to give su(1) any
flags.
jen ALL, !SERVERS = ALL
The user jen may run any command on any machine except for those in the SERVERS Host_Alias (master,
mail, www and ns).
jill SERVERS = /usr/bin/, !SU, !SHELLS
For any machine in the SERVERS Host_Alias, jill may run any commands in the directory /usr/bin/
except for those commands belonging to the SU and SHELLS Cmnd_Aliases.
steve CSNETS = (operator) /usr/local/op_commands/
The user steve may run any command in the directory /usr/local/op_commands/ but only as user opera-tor. operator.
tor.
matt valkyrie = KILL
On his personal workstation, valkyrie, matt needs to be able to kill hung processes.
WEBMASTERS www = (www) ALL, (root) /usr/bin/su www
On the host www, any user in the WEBMASTERS User_Alias (will, wendy, and wim), may run any command as
user www (which owns the web pages) or simply su(1) to www.
ALL CDROM = NOPASSWD: /sbin/umount /CDROM,\
/sbin/mount -o nosuid\,nodev /dev/cd0a /CDROM
Any user may mount or unmount a CD-ROM on the machines in the CDROM Host_Alias (orion, perseus, her-cules) hercules)
cules) without entering a password. This is a bit tedious for users to type, so it is a prime candi-date candidate
date for encapsulating in a shell script.
SECURITY NOTES
It is generally not effective to "subtract" commands from ALL using the '!' operator. A user can
trivially circumvent this by copying the desired command to a different name and then executing that.
For example:
bill ALL = ALL, !SU, !SHELLS
Doesn't really prevent bill from running the commands listed in SU or SHELLS since he can simply copy
those commands to a different name, or use a shell escape from an editor or other program. There-fore, Therefore,
fore, these kind of restrictions should be considered advisory at best (and reinforced by policy).
PREVENTING SHELL ESCAPES
Once sudo executes a program, that program is free to do whatever it pleases, including run other
programs. This can be a security issue since it is not uncommon for a program to allow shell
escapes, which lets a user bypass sudo's restrictions. Common programs that permit shell escapes
include shells (obviously), editors, paginators, mail and terminal programs.
Many systems that support shared libraries have the ability to override default library functions by
pointing an environment variable (usually LD_PRELOAD) to an alternate shared library. On such sys-tems, systems,
tems, sudo's noexec functionality can be used to prevent a program run by sudo from executing any
other programs. Note, however, that this applies only to native dynamically-linked executables.
Statically-linked executables and foreign executables running under binary emulation are not
affected.
To tell whether or not sudo supports noexec, you can run the following as root:
sudo -V | grep "dummy exec"
If the resulting output contains a line that begins with:
File containing dummy exec functions:
then sudo may be able to replace the exec family of functions in the standard library with its own
that simply return an error. Unfortunately, there is no foolproof way to know whether or not noexec
will work at compile-time. Noexec should work on SunOS, Solaris, *BSD, Linux, IRIX, Tru64 UNIX,
MacOS X, and HP-UX 11.x. It is known not to work on AIX and UnixWare. Noexec is expected to work on
most operating systems that support the LD_PRELOAD environment variable. Check your operating sys-tem's system's
tem's manual pages for the dynamic linker (usually ld.so, ld.so.1, dyld, dld.sl, rld, or loader) to
see if LD_PRELOAD is supported.
To enable noexec for a command, use the NOEXEC tag as documented in the User Specification section
above. Here is that example again:
aaron shanty = NOEXEC: /usr/bin/more, /usr/bin/vi
This allows user aaron to run /usr/bin/more and /usr/bin/vi with noexec enabled. This will prevent
those two commands from executing other commands (such as a shell). If you are unsure whether or not
your system is capable of supporting noexec you can always just try it out and see if it works.
Note that disabling shell escapes is not a panacea. Programs running as root are still capable of
many potentially hazardous operations (such as changing or overwriting files) that could lead to
unintended privilege escalation. In the specific case of an editor, a safer approach is to give the
user permission to run sudoedit.
SEE ALSO
rsh(1), su(1), fnmatch(3), sudo(8), visudo(8)
CAVEATS
The sudoers file should always be edited by the visudo command which locks the file and does grammat-ical grammatical
ical checking. It is imperative that sudoers be free of syntax errors since sudo will not run with a
syntactically incorrect sudoers file.
When using netgroups of machines (as opposed to users), if you store fully qualified hostnames in the
netgroup (as is usually the case), you either need to have the machine's hostname be fully qualified
as returned by the hostname command or use the fqdn option in sudoers.
BUGS
If you feel you have found a bug in sudo, please submit a bug report at http://www.sudo.ws/sudo/bugs/
SUPPORT
Commercial support is available for sudo, see http://www.sudo.ws/sudo/support.html for details.
Limited free support is available via the sudo-users mailing list, see http://www.sudo.ws/mail-
man/listinfo/sudo-users to subscribe or search the archives.
DISCLAIMER
Sudo is provided ``AS IS'' and any express or implied warranties, including, but not limited to, the
implied warranties of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose are disclaimed. See the
LICENSE file distributed with sudo or http://www.sudo.ws/sudo/license.html for complete details.
1.6.8p12 June 20, 2005 SUDOERS(5)
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