A group password in Linux
http://meinit.nl/a-group-password-in-linux
Have you ever heard of (or used) a group password in Linux? For me this strange concept was new, but here's what you can use it for.
A group password in Linux allows a user to temporarily (in a subshell) gain extra permissions of a group, after successfully entering the group password.
To set a group password use gpasswd:
# gpasswd finance
New Password:
Re-enter new password:
To gain those extra permissions you can use newgrp:
$ newgrp finance
Some of the disadvantages are:
- Sharing a password is not good; a password should be personal.
- You can also solve this by adding the user to a secondary group.
- Another way to solve it is to use sudo.
- Usage of the group password is not accountable.