Privilege separation

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In computer programming, privilege separation is a technique used to mitigate the potential damage of a computer security attack. In its most basic form, a computer program forks into two processes. The main program drops privileges, and the smaller program keeps privileges in order to perform a certain task. The two halves then communicate via a socket pair. Thus, any successful attack against the larger program will gain minimal access, even though the pair of programs will be capable of performing privileged operations.

[edit] See also

• Principle of least privilege
• Capability-based security
• Confused deputy problem
• Privilege escalation
• Defensive programming
• Privilege bracketing
• Privilege revocation

[edit] External links

• Theo de Raadt: Exploit Mitigation Techniques in OpenBSD slides
• Niels Provos, Markus Friedl, Peter Honeyman: Preventing Privilege Escalation paper
• Niels Provos: Privilege Separated OpenSSH project