Re: changing root account name

From: Gaz Wilson (dragon@linux2.nccnet.co.uk)
Date: 10/31/01 

Date: Wed, 31 Oct 2001 18:42:13 +0000 (GMT)
From: Gaz Wilson <dragon@linux2.nccnet.co.uk>
To: Philipp Schulte <pschulte@uni-duisburg.de>
Subject: Re: changing root account name
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.33.0110311837530.8200-100000@linux2.nccnet.co.uk>

> On Tue, Oct 30, 2001 at 10:12:34AM -0500, Kurt Yoder wrote:
>
> > Would there be any benefit in changing the account name of "root"? For
> > instance, I could change the uid 0 account to have the name "foobar".
> > Then, if someone were trying to break into the root account, they would
> > have an additional step; instead of logging in as root, they'd first
> > have to find out what the uid 0 account was called.
>
> less /etc/passwd | grep "0:0"
>

In fact correct me if I'm wrong, but lots of Unices simply expect the
superuser account to be the first line in the passwd file? I seem
to remember reasing something about it years ago?

So if that's the case, as any user:

head -n 1 /etc/passwd

Would work every time! the example above ending in "grep 0:0" wouldn't
necesarilly work, for instance, root on Solaris looks thus:

root:x:0:1:Super-User:/:/bin/sh

Gaz 

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