Security in Computing 5th Edition by Shari Lawrence Pfleeger, Charles P Pfleeger, Jonathan Margulies

Exercise 13

Why should the directory of one user not be generally accessible (for read-only access) to other users?

Step 1 of 2

Access directory

It is not advisable for a user to access the directory of another user due to the reasons given below:

• Chain passing of rights

It would be convenient to explain this reason with the example. Let us assume user A is the owner of the file F in its directory. Another user B accesses the file F and afterwards grants its access to the user C. Now, if the user A wants to delete the access right from the user B, conflict arises since the user A is unaware of the access of file by user C; thus creating conflict in the existence of the file F.