How the Trusted Solaris Environment Enforces Access Control Policy

The Trusted Solaris environment protects information and other resources through discretionary access control--the traditional UNIX permission bits and access control lists set at the discretion of the owner--and mandatory access control--a mechanism enforced by the system automatically that controls all transactions by checking the labels of processes and data in the transaction.

A user's label represents the sensitivity level at which the user is permitted to and chooses to operate. It determines which information the user is allowed to access. Both mandatory and discretionary access controls can be overridden by special permissions called privileges, which are granted to processes. In some cases, users may need authorizations as well, which are granted to users (and roles) by an administrator.

As administrator, you need to train users on the proper procedures for securing their files and directories, according to your site's security policy. Furthermore, you should instruct any users allowed to upgrade or downgrade labels as to when it is appropriate to change a label.