passwd: Permission denied ?
Frank Bonnet
I'm trying to change a local user passwd as root and I get this error
message ... which seems a bit unreal to me ...
passwd: Permission denied
passwd: password unchanged
The machine is running Lenny 64 bits
Thank you
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Sven Joachim
> I'm trying to change a local user passwd as root and I get this error
> message ... which seems a bit unreal to me ...
>
>
> passwd: Permission denied
> passwd: password unchanged
What does "lsattr /etc/passwd /etc/shadow" print?
Sven
Jerome BENOIT
what gives
ls -l /etc/passwd
lsattr /etc/passwd
?
Jerome
Frank Bonnet wrote:
> Hello
>
> I'm trying to change a local user passwd as root and I get this error
> message ... which seems a bit unreal to me ...
>
>
> passwd: Permission denied
> passwd: password unchanged
>
>
> The machine is running Lenny 64 bits
>
> Thank you
>
>
--
Jerome BENOIT
jgmbenoit_at_mailsnare_dot_net
Frank Bonnet
> On 2009-09-18 09:34 +0200, Frank Bonnet wrote:
>
>> I'm trying to change a local user passwd as root and I get this error
>> message ... which seems a bit unreal to me ...
>>
>>
>> passwd: Permission denied
>> passwd: password unchanged
>
> What does "lsattr /etc/passwd /etc/shadow" print?
this ... how it has been changed ? this is a fresh install
does this mean another admin has changed the default attr ?
lsattr /etc/passwd /etc/shadow
------------------- /etc/passwd
------------------- /etc/shadow
Frank Bonnet
> Hello Frank,
>
> what gives
> ls -l /etc/passwd
> lsattr /etc/passwd
well I am logged as root which is supposed in a UNIX world
to have access to all files of the local filesystem without
access right checking huh ?
ls -l /etc/passwd
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1358 2009-09-18 09:21 /etc/passwd
lsattr /etc/passwd
------------------- /etc/passwd
>
> ?
>
> Jerome
>
> Frank Bonnet wrote:
>> Hello
>>
>> I'm trying to change a local user passwd as root and I get this error
>> message ... which seems a bit unreal to me ...
>>
>>
>> passwd: Permission denied
>> passwd: password unchanged
>>
>>
>> The machine is running Lenny 64 bits
>>
>> Thank you
>>
>>
>
--
Jerome BENOIT
Frank Bonnet wrote:
> Sven Joachim wrote:
>> On 2009-09-18 09:34 +0200, Frank Bonnet wrote:
>>
>>> I'm trying to change a local user passwd as root and I get this error
>>> message ... which seems a bit unreal to me ...
>>>
>>>
>>> passwd: Permission denied
>>> passwd: password unchanged
>>
>> What does "lsattr /etc/passwd /etc/shadow" print?
>
> this ... how it has been changed ? this is a fresh install
> does this mean another admin has changed the default attr ?
>
>
> lsattr /etc/passwd /etc/shadow
> ------------------- /etc/passwd
> ------------------- /etc/shadow
>
I guess that `ls -l' is clean too:
is the associated partition mounted as read-only ?
Jerome
>>
>> Sven
>>
>>
>
>
--
Jerome BENOIT
jgmbenoit_at_mailsnare_dot_net
Jerome BENOIT
Frank Bonnet wrote:
> Jerome BENOIT wrote:
>> Hello Frank,
>>
>> what gives
>> ls -l /etc/passwd
>> lsattr /etc/passwd
>
> well I am logged as root which is supposed in a UNIX world
> to have access to all files of the local filesystem without
> access right checking huh ?
may be, but you issue is, as you said, unreal.
have you strace passwd to have a better idea of what is going on ?
Jerome
>
>
> ls -l /etc/passwd
> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1358 2009-09-18 09:21 /etc/passwd
>
>
> lsattr /etc/passwd
> ------------------- /etc/passwd
>
>>
>> ?
>>
>> Jerome
>>
>> Frank Bonnet wrote:
>>> Hello
>>>
>>> I'm trying to change a local user passwd as root and I get this error
>>> message ... which seems a bit unreal to me ...
>>>
>>>
>>> passwd: Permission denied
>>> passwd: password unchanged
>>>
>>>
>>> The machine is running Lenny 64 bits
>>>
>>> Thank you
>>>
>>>
>>
>
>
--
Jerome BENOIT
jgmbenoit_at_mailsnare_dot_net
Frank Bonnet
> Hello,
>
> Frank Bonnet wrote:
>> Sven Joachim wrote:
>>> On 2009-09-18 09:34 +0200, Frank Bonnet wrote:
>>>
>>>> I'm trying to change a local user passwd as root and I get this error
>>>> message ... which seems a bit unreal to me ...
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> passwd: Permission denied
>>>> passwd: password unchanged
>>>
>>> What does "lsattr /etc/passwd /etc/shadow" print?
>>
>> this ... how it has been changed ? this is a fresh install
>> does this mean another admin has changed the default attr ?
>>
>>
>> lsattr /etc/passwd /etc/shadow
>> ------------------- /etc/passwd
>> ------------------- /etc/shadow
>>
>
> I guess that `ls -l' is clean too:
> is the associated partition mounted as read-only ?
>
> Jerome
no the files are standing on the / partition
Sven Joachim
> Sven Joachim wrote:
>> On 2009-09-18 09:34 +0200, Frank Bonnet wrote:
>>
>>> I'm trying to change a local user passwd as root and I get this error
>>> message ... which seems a bit unreal to me ...
>>>
>>>
>>> passwd: Permission denied
>>> passwd: password unchanged
>>
>> What does "lsattr /etc/passwd /etc/shadow" print?
>
> this ... how it has been changed ? this is a fresh install
> does this mean another admin has changed the default attr ?
This may happen because of an intruder or because of file system
corruption. I've seen the latter a few times on this list. But...
> lsattr /etc/passwd /etc/shadow
> ------------------- /etc/passwd
> ------------------- /etc/shadow
...this is how it's supposed to be, i.e. no special attributes. Can
you run the process under strace?
Sven Joachim
> I guess that `ls -l' is clean too:
> is the associated partition mounted as read-only ?
AFAIK in that case the error message would be "Read-only file system"
rather than "Permission denied".
Sven
Frank Bonnet
fsck cannot correct the problem too
It might be a hardware problem ... (sigh !)
--
Chris Davies
> I'm trying to change a local user passwd as root and I get this error
> message ... which seems a bit unreal to me ...
> passwd: Permission denied
Suspect you've lost the setuid permission bit on /usr/bin/passwd:
ls -l /usr/bin/passwd
-rwsr-xr-x 1 root root 34392 2009-05-22 16:03 /usr/bin/passwd
If you don't see an 's' in the fourth character position then that's
the problem, and you can fix it with these commands run as root:
chown root:root /usr/bin/passwd
chmod u=rwx,go=rx,u+s /usr/bin/passwd # 4755 if you insist
Chris
Ron Johnson
> Hello
>
> I'm trying to change a local user passwd as root and I get this error
> message ... which seems a bit unreal to me ...
>
>
> passwd: Permission denied
> passwd: password unchanged
>
>
> The machine is running Lenny 64 bits
Dumb question: how are you trying to change the password?
--
Ron Johnson, Jr.
Jefferson LA USA
"If God had wanted man to play soccer, he wouldn't have given
us arms." Mike Ditka
Tzafrir Cohen
> Hello
>
> I'm trying to change a local user passwd as root and I get this error
> message ... which seems a bit unreal to me ...
>
>
> passwd: Permission denied
> passwd: password unchanged
>
>
> The machine is running Lenny 64 bits
Two places to look into:
1. /var/log/auth.log
2. /etc/pam.d/passwd
--
Tzafrir Cohen | tza...@jabber.org | VIM is
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Jon Dowland
> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1358 2009-09-18 09:21 /etc/passwd
These permissions are wrong.
The missing suid bit (as someone else pointed out) will
prevent anyone but root using it.
The missing e(x)ecute bit will prevent even root.
Either restore +x (and +s), or something like
# /lib/ld-2.9.so /usr/bin/passwd
I would also worry about *precicely how* the permissions
were changed.
--
Jon Dowland
Sven Joachim
> On Fri, Sep 18, 2009 at 11:39:28AM +0200, Frank Bonnet wrote:
>
>> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1358 2009-09-18 09:21 /etc/passwd
>
> These permissions are wrong.
No, they are not. It's /etc/passwd, not /usr/bin/passwd.
Sven