Bugzilla – Bug 134609
permissions.secure breaks startx for non-root user
Last modified: 2005-11-21 08:38:06 UTC
Setting the security level to set the permissions specified in /etc/permissions.secure takes the SUID bit off /usr/X11R6/bin/Xorg. This means that unpreveleged users can't run the startx command to get a graphical interface on a text console, say a machine in runlevel 3. The files and permissions in permissions.secure seem to be lagging the files and links in /usr/X11R6/bin as: lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 4 2005-09-27 03:30 XFree86 -> Xorg* -rwx--x--x 1 root root 1847788 2005-09-16 22:58 Xorg* lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 7 2005-04-28 18:28 Xwrapper -> XFree86* /usr/X11R6/bin/Xorg root:root 0711 /usr/X11R6/bin/Xwrapper root:root 4755 Xorg gets its SUID bit stripped, Xwrapper is just a link so doesn't benefit from a SUID bit, and Xfree is left out entirely. I'd suggest that if leaving a generally acessible SUID bit on Xorg is dangerous, that it's group be changed to video and only members of that group be allowed allowed to run startx. /usr/X11R6/bin/Xorg root:video 4710 /usr/X11R6/bin/Xwrapper ( -> Xorg directly ) root:root 755 /usr/X11R6/bin/Xfree root:root 755 Or else Xwrapper carry the SUID bit but be made a real wrapper that protects against misuse of a preveleged Xorg. I can't see the sense of setting permissions.secure so tight that people are forced to back down to permissions.easy to use the system normally.
*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of 134611 ***