82855 - Running mozilla processes as another user

Status: RESOLVED DUPLICATE of bug 80051

(SeaMonkey :: General, defect)

Description

[ribenakid]

Just downloaded 0.9 rpm and installed.

I accidently started mozilla from the root shell, before shutting down the root
version I started mozilla from a shell for my ordinary user and another root
mozilla window popped up.

I know it was another root owned one because the bookmarks are different for
the ordinary user.

This has serious system security issues if one user can instruct another users
mozilla process to do things. I'd guess it would be an easy task to knock up a
local file system java program and have another users mozilla process execute it.

Comment 1

[James Green]

Can you repeat this and check, while both mozilla processes are running, ps axu.
This should reveal exactly who is running what.

Comment 2

[R.K.Aa.]

If this bug really happened, it's a Linux bug. But I doubt it happened.
There are Mozilla bugs about invisible windows these days, where content loads
without rendering the window visibly. If a new window suddenly spawned and
belonged to root, then mozilla processes run by root weren't dead yet.
I think what reporter observed may be related to bug 73893 or bug 82159.

Comment 3

[ribenakid]

Yes, this really happens!

In a root xterm:
[root@piglet /root]# mozilla

(mozilla is still running, I haven't quit it yet)

Now in normal user xterm:
[trk@piglet trk]$ mozilla http://www.btinternet.com/
[trk@piglet trk]$ ps -ef | grep mozilla
root     10171 10023 17 19:49 pts/0    00:00:10 /usr/lib/mozilla/mozilla-bin
root     10176 10171  0 19:49 pts/0    00:00:00 /usr/lib/mozilla/mozilla-bin
root     10177 10176  0 19:49 pts/0    00:00:00 /usr/lib/mozilla/mozilla-bin
root     10178 10176  0 19:49 pts/0    00:00:00 /usr/lib/mozilla/mozilla-bin
root     10198 10176  0 19:50 pts/0    00:00:00 /usr/lib/mozilla/mozilla-bin
trk      10209  5798  0 19:50 pts/3    00:00:00 grep mozilla
[trk@piglet trk]$ 

Note that the normal users mozilla command exitted, the effect of this command
was to open www.btinternet.com on roots mozilla window.

Comment 4

[James Green]

I've just tried this, and amazingly enough I found a set of mozilla processes
that had been idling sine May 23rd!

Anyway, I killed those off, made sure no mozilla processes were running, then
ran moz as root. That went fine. I double-checked with 'ps' and only root was
running mozilla. I then ran mozilla as a normal user, and a second mozilla
window came up and 'ps' showed identical processes running under different
users; the windows clearly showed the standard 'root' profile versus my
personalised 'jg' mozilla profile.

Reporter: how do you mean, "Note that the normal users mozilla command
exitted..." ? Did you quit it? Did it 'die' before it opened a window? I think
you are seeing other bugs, but it looks as if it's 'hijacking' root's process.

If you can offer any further logs of processes and reproducable steps, please
do. Otherwise, with no-one else reporting the problem, I'm afraid this will be
marked as RESOLVED WORKSFORME soonish. Thanks.

I'm adding qawanted to try and get some more testers on this.

Comment 5

[ribenakid]

The sequence of events is:
start mozilla as root
mozilla window opens on URL http://www.mozilla.org/
start mozilla as normal user accessing another page
roots mozilla window changes to the new page
normal user mozilla process exits, shell returns to the prompt
quit mozilla
root shell returns to prompt

Alternatively if the normal user doesn't specify a url, then a new browser
window is opened as root.

This also works the other way round, ie if the normal user starts mozilla first,
then running mozilla as root opens another normal user window.

I'm running Xfree86 4.0.2 with a 2.4.4 kernel, using the Redhat 7 rpms (If
that's any help).
[root@piglet /root]# rpm -qa | grep mozilla
mozilla-mail-0.9-0
mozilla-0.9-0
mozilla-psm-0.9-0
mozilla-chat-0.9-0

Comment 6

[ribenakid]

I've been looking at what happens when the mozilla command from the rpm
(/usr/bin/mozilla) is executed. The first thing it always tries is a mozilla-bin
-remote 'openurl(...)'. If I bypass the startup script and run mozilla-bin
directly I get the following happening:

       root: # /usr/lib/mozilla/mozilla-bin
mozilla window opens as root

normal user: $ /usr/lib/mozilla/mozilla-bin -remote
'openurl(http://www.btinternet.com/,new-window)'
new root mozilla window opens

normal user: $ /usr/lib/mozilla/mozilla-bin
new normal user process starts and normal user window opens

normal user: $ /usr/lib/mozilla/mozilla-bin -remote
'openurl(http://www.btinternet.com/,new-window)'
new normal user window opens

       root: # /usr/lib/mozilla/mozilla-bin -remote
'openurl(http://www.btinternet.com/,new-window)'
new normal user window opens

Comment 7

[timeless]

*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of 80051 ***