To RedHat, Mandrake and other bloated distros user

Make sure the finger daemon is not running. SkyWolf had it running and finger represents a frigging big security risk. So, if fingerd is running, close it by all means.

[pbharris]

hi vince,
i don't know much about finger - in redhat it is started and stoped by xinetd - my finger file says it is disabled but i can finger my wife w/o a problem...

[Ashcrow]

hi vince,
i don't know much about finger - in redhat it is started and stoped by xinetd - my finger file says it is disabled but i can finger my wife w/o a problem...

lol ....

Slackware runs finger by default as well. Stop it!

[pbharris]

hum - on my debian box it is running from inetd.d - i am thinking the x/inetd services are okay .. yes?

[trickster]

*SkyWolf had it running and finger represents a frigging big security risk. *

Why?

Why?

[vince@vincent: ~]% finger @209.161.239.13  
[209.161.239.13]
Login   Name      Tty   Idle Login Time  Office   Office Phone
ken    Kenneth Chung *pts/1  103d Apr 13 19:13
ken    Kenneth Chung *pts/2  103d Apr 13 14:33
root   root      tty1      Apr 14 14:57
root   root      *pts/3  103d Apr 11 15:57
[vince@vincent: ~]%

So now I got a user name to start trying to hack your machine.

[pbharris]

redhat box:

[pbharris@bugs ~]finger @192.168.0.4  
finger: cannot create socket / connet host
[pbharris@bugs ~]

debian box:

[pbharris@bugs ~]finger @192.168.0.2
No one logged on.
[pbharris@bugs ~]

hummmsssss

[trickster]

[vince@vincent: ~]% finger @209.161.239.13 * 
[209.161.239.13]
Login * * Name * * * * * *Tty * * *Idle *Login Time * Office * * Office Phone
ken * * * Kenneth Chung **pts/1 * *103d *Apr 13 19:13
ken * * * Kenneth Chung **pts/2 * *103d *Apr 13 14:33
root * * *root * * * * * *tty1 * * * * * Apr 14 14:57
root * * *root * * * * * *pts/3 * *103d *Apr 11 15:57
[vince@vincent: ~]%

So now I got a user name to start trying to hack your machine.

you know all machines will have a username called root.

you know all machines will have a username called root.

But 98% of the time root is denied all network access. So you need to find a normal user (ken) to get in.

[trickster]

But 98% of the time root is denied all network access. *So you need to find a normal user (ken) to get in.

that makes sense. Whos Ken?