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by pram 1036 days ago
Does this mean that RMS is ideologically opposed to sudo?
1 comments

Maybe. You still only have to learn one password under each system. If someone named foobar sympathizes with you and leaks their password, then you login in as foobar and "sudo bash" or whatever. The way RMS envisions is that the root password is shared among many people and one of them shares it with you (there is no way to know who), and then you use your own account to "su" and use the root password.

It's easy to get someone in trouble in either case. If the user foobar starts doing crazy stuff as root, then foobar is in trouble. If you get the root password and start doing crazy stuff, then your username is associated with the troublemaking. (Assume that the logs go to some machine where you don't have access to remove them.) RMS's mechanism shifts the responsibility for your actions onto you, so that someone who knows the root password is more likely to leak it to you.

The best of both worlds is to get the root password, then find a hapless coworker who left their screen unlocked while out to lunch. su with the root password there, cause your chaos, everyone blames lunch guy. (Do look for outside systems; people and cameras can see you using someone's computer. Was always funny to me how many people have tried something like this, only to be nailed by the security cameras.)