LinuxWorld: Ask the Geek

“How do I allow the nobody user to access user directories
without giving access to anybody else?“

“With increasing demand for Internet usage and more customers
wanting shell access to ISPs’ servers, the simple security solution
I describe below can be very helpful. If you check with many ISPs,
you’ll find that they have not implemented this capability; most of
their user directories will be set to either mode 755 or mode 711,
which will allow any user to enter.”

“This is a common problem, because most users would like the
option of hosting Webpages or other more personal files. In order
to host Webpages, the user of the Web server (typically the nobody
user) must have access to the user’s public_html directory. There
are several ways to implement this; after some consideration, I
believe I’ve arrived at a simple and effective solution.”

Complete Story