Bug#566831: sshd started after upgrade even if not running and disabled
On Mon, Jan 25, 2010 at 12:29:12PM +0100, MP wrote:
> Package: openssh-server
> Version: 1:5.2p1-2
>
> I have configured ssh-server to be not running by default (no symlink
> in rc*.d directories to /etc/init.d/ssh), since I start the sshd only
> rarely and only when I'm on "secure" network. And even though ssh was
> not running, upgrading ssh via apt-get "restarted" the server,
> effectively starting it:
>
> Setting up openssh-server (1:5.2p1-2) ...
> update-rc.d: warning: ssh start runlevel arguments (2 3 4 5) do not
> match LSB Default-Start values (none)
> update-rc.d: warning: ssh stop runlevel arguments (none) do not match
> LSB Default-Stop values (1)
> Restarting OpenBSD Secure Shell server: sshd.
>
> I think the sshd should only be restarted when it is actually running,
> otherwise it can open up to password-guessing attacks or alike on some
> configurations when I do not expect sshd to be automatically running
> in first place...
The defined way to do this in the sysv-rc scheme is to add 'K' links to
each of the rc*.d directories, rather than just deleting the links
altogether. If you delete the links, then the state is undefined and
you may well find that packages sometimes put 'S' links back. I suspect
that's what's happened in this case.
(Yes, this is weird and confusing; but it's a property of how sysv-rc is
defined rather than really being the fault of the openssh packaging ...)
--
Colin Watson [cjwatson@debian.org]
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