Solaris™ 8 Advanced System Administrator's Guide, Third Edition

File Security

All of the users logged into the Solaris operating system can read and use files belonging to one another as long as they have permission to do so. UNIX file security is based on a combination of user classes and file and directory permissions, as described briefly in the following sections.

NOTE

In most cases, you can keep sensitive files in an inaccessible directory (700 mode) and make such files unreadable by others (600 mode). However, anyone who guesses your password or has access to the root password can read and write to any file on the local system. In addition, the sensitive file is preserved on backup tapes every time you back up the system. Sensitive files can be retrieved by anyone having access to the backup media. ...