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SELinux
Want to know how to make Linux really secure? Security Enhanced Linux (SE Linux), a system of security policies developed by the NSA, let you secure Linux at every level from the kernel up. Find out how EnGarde Secure Linux and others build and maintain a truly secure server environment.
Source: SecurityBlog::Brindle - Posted by Bill Keys
During the last year quite a bit of effort has gone into improving SELinux’ networking support, thanks to the great SELinux community. While this support is still evolving it will be very beneficial for people to try it out and give feedback so the final result is useful to more users and meets the security needs of a wider audience. As the network support in SELinux continues to evolve (there are already other ideas being discussed for possible inclusion) I’ll try to keep this post updated so that people who find it will have the latest information available.
The developers of one of the most secure operating systems available will use one of the most open collaboration platforms to continue work. The development community for SELinux will can start to use a newly created wiki site for collaboration and discussion, announced James Morris on the SELinux mailing list last week.
Source: Search Open Source - Posted by Efren J. Belizario
Administrators often criticize Security Enhanced Linux (SELinux) policies for being too complex, and they have a point. Mandatory access control-based administration is tedious and easy to misconfigure. It can be tough to handle the extended security attributes across a range of users, processes and files or directories that encompass more than one server. Novell addresses this problem in its enterprise-class server offerings with the AppArmor suite of policy management applications, but nothing comparable exists yet for systems management in Red Hat enterprise servers (or CentOS derivatives).
The good thing about SELinux (Security-Enhanced Linux) is that it can really help you lock down a Linux system. The bad thing about SELinux is that it can be a real pain to put all those locks and chains in place in the first place.
SELinux is a mandatory access control (MAC) system available in Linux kernels as of version 2.6. Of the Linux Security Modules available, it is the most comprehensive and well tested, and is founded on 20 years of MAC research. SELinux combines a type-enforcement server with either multi-level security or an optional multi-category policy, and a notion of role-based access control. See the Resources section later in this article for links to more information about these topics.
Most people who have used SELinux have done so by using an SELinux-ready distribution such as Fedora, Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL), Debian, or hardened Gentoo. These enable SELinux in the kernel, offer a customizable security policy, and patch a great number of user-land libraries and utilities to make them SELinux aware.
(Editorial comment: EnGarde Secure Linux is an SELinux-ready distibution)
Source: Government Computer News - Posted by Eric Lubow
The release of a new open-source security package has sparked debate over how many Mandatory Access Control applications Linux really needs, and if more than one would just dilute volunteer efforts. Novell Inc. of Provo, Utah, recently released the source code for its recently acquired Linux security application, AppArmor. It also set up a project site in hopes of attracting outside developers to further refine the program.
Source: Government Computer News - Posted by Eric Lubow
Novell Inc. of Provo, Utah, has released the source code for its recently acquired open-source Linux security application, AppArmor, and has also set up a project site in hopes of attracting outside developers to further refine the program. The release of the software has sparked debate in the open-source community, however.
Source: IT Observer - Posted by Benjamin D. Thomas
In this paper I will try to explain the philosophy behind the Security Enhanced Linux (SE Linux). I will however try to explain the concept with an example but to keep the length readable I will restrain myself to go into much of implementation details for e.g. commands and similar stuff.
Hi, and welcome to the third in a series of articles on Security
Enhanced Linux. My first
SELinux article detailed the background of SELinux, while my second
article in the series discussed how SELinux makes access decisions.
This week, I'll talk about how an SELinux system differs from a
standard Linux system in terms of administration. Most of what you
already know about Linux system administration will still apply to an
SELinux system, but there are some additions and changes that are
critical to understand when using SELinux.
