Re: AppArmor FAQ

James Morris
2007-04-18T13:33:34Z

On Wed, 18 Apr 2007, David Lang wrote:

> SELinux is designed to be able to make the box safe against root, AA is
> designed to let the admin harden exposed apps without having to think about
> the other things on the system.

This is not correct.

SELinux was designed as an access control framework which allows various
security models to be composed in a controlled and consistent manner,
covering all security-relevant interactions in the system.

The type enforcement model included with it provides a means to address
both integrity and confidentiality requirements. It _can_ protect you
against root, if that's what you want (in fact, the Russell Coker "play
box" was online for many years with a published root password), but it
does not have to.

Indeed, since Fedora Core 3, the default SELinux policy has been
"targeted", which is aimed at confining exposed applications.

- James
--
James Morris
<jmorris@namei.org>