when_the_weberver_needs_a_home_directory

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From: Drew Bertola <drew@drewb.com>
Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2000 02:27:40 +0000 ()
To: svlug@svlug.org
Subject: [svlug] user nobody and gpg...

I would like to set up my webserver to mail encrypted data to me.
Because the server could be compromised, it is essential that the
encryption scheme use a public / private pair, with the public key
only stored on the webserver.

I have always set up the server to run apache as user "nobody" with no
home_dir or shell.  Apache is running with mod_php, so that also runs
as "nobody".  Using php, I can grab the information, but how do I get
it to gpg encrypt it before mailing it out?  I.E. Where do I put the
public key if there's no home_dir for "nobody"?


-- 
Drew Bertola  | Send a text message to my pager or cell ... 
              |   http://jpager.com/Drew




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From: kmself@ix.netcom.com
Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2000 18:57:19 -0800
To: svlug@svlug.org
Subject: Re: [svlug] user nobody and gpg...


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on Mon, Nov 20, 2000 at 02:27:40AM +0000, Drew Bertola (drew@drewb.com) wro=
te:
> I would like to set up my webserver to mail encrypted data to me.
> Because the server could be compromised, it is essential that the
> encryption scheme use a public / private pair, with the public key
> only stored on the webserver.
>=20
> I have always set up the server to run apache as user "nobody" with no
> home_dir or shell.  Apache is running with mod_php, so that also runs
> as "nobody".  Using php, I can grab the information, but how do I get
> it to gpg encrypt it before mailing it out?  I.E. Where do I put the
> public key if there's no home_dir for "nobody"?

    $ man gpg | less
    /--homedir

--=20
Karsten M. Self <kmself@ix.netcom.com>     http://www.netcom.com/~kmself
 Evangelist, Zelerate, Inc.                      http://www.zelerate.org
  What part of "Gestalt" don't you understand?      There is no K5 cabal
   http://gestalt-system.sourceforge.net/        http://www.kuro5hin.org

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Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2000 19:26:05 -0800
From: Aaron Lehmann <aaronl@vitelus.com>
To: Drew Bertola <drew@drewb.com>
Cc: svlug@svlug.org
Subject: Re: [svlug] user nobody and gpg...


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On Mon, Nov 20, 2000 at 02:27:40AM +0000, Drew Bertola wrote:
> I have always set up the server to run apache as user "nobody" with no
> home_dir or shell.  Apache is running with mod_php, so that also runs
> as "nobody".  Using php, I can grab the information, but how do I get
> it to gpg encrypt it before mailing it out?  I.E. Where do I put the
> public key if there's no home_dir for "nobody"?

If you want a place to store persistant data, you probably want a home
directory. Creating a home directory for "nobody" would be a simple
solution, but it would be much cleaner to make a seperate user for the
web server. Debian has a www-data user for this purpose.

Of course, if gpg does not require a home directory you could simply
make a directory in /var or /home containing the key and chown -R it to
nobody....

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Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2000 00:28:33 -0500
From: Bill Jonas <bill@billjonas.com>
To: svlug@svlug.org
Subject: Re: [svlug] user nobody and gpg...

On Sun, Nov 19, 2000 at 07:26:05PM -0800, Aaron Lehmann wrote:
> Of course, if gpg does not require a home directory you could simply
> make a directory in /var or /home containing the key and chown -R it to
> nobody....

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the entire point of nobody is that that
user owns no files?

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