'sign' modules? was: RE: 'lock' modules?

A similar, but different, problem has been bothering me recently.  As more
and more people start using linux, it is inevitable that there will be
modules out there that are basically trojan horses - promising to turn your
cdrom into a burner was my favorite about 5 years ago.

Anyway, what if we were to institute a system where a kernel module could be
digitally signed by assorted authorities as 'blessed?'  (insert netrek
flashback here.)  I know that this sounds a bit like the crap Micro$loth has
been puting in their browser lately, but sooner or later we are going to be
faced with a lot of naive users and a lot of nefarious kernel
hackers/crackers.

The idea seriously needs some hashing out, but thinking about this sort of
thing now might save us some headache later...

	rOn

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Keith Owens [mailto:[e-mail]]
> Sent: Tuesday, June 06, 2000 9:48 PM
> To: [e-mail]
> Cc: [e-mail]
> Subject: Re: 'lock' modules? 
> 
> 
> On Tue, 6 Jun 2000 21:57:19 -0400 (EDT), 
> [e-mail] wrote:
> >I was wondering if anyone has considered modifying the linux 
> kernel such 
> >that the modules may be 'locked'.
> 
> Repeatedly.  And the answer is always the same - "how can you tell the
> difference between a good and a bad root user?".  root can build,
> change, load and unload modules, whether on this session or 
> on the next
> reboot.  There is no way to distinguish between an authorised 
> root user
> and an "unauthorised" root user, a root by any other name has the same
> power.
> 
> 
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