Securing the Hardware

You can protect the physical machine by requiring a password to boot the machine. You can also protect the machine by preventing a user from using the abort sequence to leave the windowing system.

How to Require a Password for Hardware Access

1. Become superuser or assume an equivalent role.

2. In a terminal, enter the PROM security mode. Type the following:

   # eeprom security-mode=command Changing PROM password: New password: password Retype new password: password

   Choose the value command or full. See the eeprom(1M) man page for more details.

3. If you are not prompted to enter a PROM password, the system already has a PROM password. To change the PROM password, run the command:

   # eeprom security-password=<Type the Return key> Changing PROM password: New password: password Retype new password: password

   The new PROM security mode and password are in effect immediately, but are most likely to be noticed at the next boot.

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   Caution –

   Do not forget the PROM password. The hardware is unusable without this password.

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How to Disable or Enable a System's Abort Sequence

Use the following procedure to disable a machine's abort sequence. The default system behavior is that a system's abort sequence is enabled.

Some server systems have a key switch. When the switch is set in the secure position, the switch overrides the software keyboard abort settings. So, any changes that you make with the following procedure might not be implemented.

1. Become superuser or assume an equivalent role.

2. Change the value of KEYBOARD_ABORT to disable.

   Comment out the enable line in the /etc/default/kbd file. Then add a disable line:

   # vi /etc/default/kbd … # KEYBOARD_ABORT affects the default behavior of the keyboard abort # sequence, see kbd(1) for details. The default value is "enable". # The optional value is "disable". Any other value is ignored. … #KEYBOARD_ABORT=enable KEYBOARD_ABORT=disable

3. Update the keyboard defaults.

   # kbd -i