How to address whitespaces in groupnames in /etc/security/access.conf

This document (7024237) is provided subject to the disclaimer at the end of this document.

Environment

SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 12

SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15

SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15 Service Pack 1 (SLES 15 SP1)

SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 12 Service Pack 3 (SLES 12 SP3)

SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 12 Service Pack 4 (SLES 12 SP4)

Situation

Working in an Active Directory (AD) environment many built-in groups have whitespaces in their name, e.g. "Domain Users".

Escaping these names in /etc/security/access.conf will not work.

Resolution

The solution is to use the "listsep" option for pam_access.so . The domain name in this example is "INTERN.PRIV". To list several groups, just use the "," as separator.

pam-config --add --access

pam-config --add --access-listsep=,

/etc/security/access.conf :

+ :INTERN.PRIV\Domain Admins:ALL
- :INTERN.PRIV\Domain Users:ALL
+ :root:ALL
- :ALL:ALL

This ruleset allows root and members of the "Domain Admins" group access to the system.

Caution: Whitespaces will now be interpreted as part of the name, therefore please check to remove all whitespaces, as in the example above, exept the ones in the user- or groupnames.

These rules are processed top-down. If the first rule processes that a user cannot login, the processing is stopped.

- :INTERN.PRIV\Domain Users:ALL

+ :INTERN.PRIV\Domain Admins:ALL

+ :root:ALL
- :ALL:ALL

This example will result in all domain users not being able to login. The first rule will be evaluated, and since the built-in Administrator user is in the group "Domain Users"

access is denied and the rule processing will be stopped.

Disclaimer

This Support Knowledgebase provides a valuable tool for SUSE customers and parties interested in our products and solutions to acquire information, ideas and learn from one another. Materials are provided for informational, personal or non-commercial use within your organization and are presented "AS IS" WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND.

Document ID:7024237
Creation Date: 05-Nov-2019
Modified Date:03-Mar-2020
- SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop
- SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
- SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications

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