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In my High school there are few computer having Ubuntu 14.04 installed and many students know the Root password, how can I block/disable certain dangerous commands like :- rm -rf / rm -rf * :(){:|:&};: to avoid Data loss ?

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    what about the simplest way? Changing the root password?
    – AlexGreg
    Aug 11, 2014 at 14:56
  • possible duplicate of Remove a terminal command
    – Parto
    Aug 11, 2014 at 14:56
  • @parto that question/answer assumes they do not have the admin password.
    – Rinzwind
    Aug 11, 2014 at 14:58
  • Cannot change root password as many students and teacher use it !!! Aug 11, 2014 at 14:58
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    @Parto Also, none of the solutions there achieve any security-related goals such as preventing people from inflicting deliberate harm. For aliasing, users can redefine their own aliases or execute commands in such a way as to bypass aliases (e.g., with their full path). Users can put back a command that has been deleted. And users can similarly make their own copy--or, if they cannot do that, bring in their own copy--of a non-setuid command they can't run. Aug 12, 2014 at 4:09

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Impossible. Absolutely impossible. If they know the admin password they can do a-n-y-t-h-i-n-g and can always revert any change you make to the system.

If you are the admin of those system you need to re-install those computers. There is no telling what those students did to those systems (for all you know they installed a keylogger, a mailserver or some dubious script and know your password seconds after you changed it) and create an admin account with a secure password.

Cannot change root password as many students and teacher use it !!!

Yes you can and yes you should. There should be 1 or 2 people that know the admin password. Other people can have elevated access but they still do not need the admin password.

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  • yes it' not possible to prevent totally that a command may be enabled back, but how to avoid accidental run of dangerous commands? command 'foobar' for example, how to disable "sudo foobar"?
    – Dan D.
    Dec 28, 2019 at 6:04

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