RPC calls

[JJ Neff]

Important to remember RPC is not a specific thing as much as it is a way of
doing something.  If you were to say, "I won't use RPC on my network because
it's inherently dangerous" then you will have very littel communication.  RPC 
Remote Procedure Call, it is how an application asks a thread to proces
elsewhere.  Normally an application only has to ask itself for any more
ifnformation, but with the advent of networks one application on A may need
info from B so it makes an RPC to request an action be taken on B and a
response given.  That response gets returned.  Many applications that work only
on one PC also use RPC calls now to themselves to emulate this behaviro so that
it doesn;t matter where the part B is local or remote.
It's the implementation of RPC that is the trouble, if a weakness is found in
the communication it can be exploited.  This can happen to any communication
stream on any system.  As stated earlier it is more likely to happen to MS
because there are more of them, more bang for the buck so to speak.
Once Linux is as popular as MS there will be many more attacks against Linux
based systems.  How many weeks have gone by that you did not receive a security
bulleting from Mandrake Security or Debian security or (dist) security.  almost
weekly flaws large enough to allow a hacker root shell access are found, Now if
the world used Mandrake and a flaw was found in say Openssh or the like that a
script kiddie posted a hack for the CNN would take notice.

Sorry for rambling, just wanted to type I guess :-)

JJN
--- John Seth <johnseth at phoenixwing.com> wrote:
> NFS, quotad, and Samba all require RPC. In RedHat (if you have or use
> it), Samba and NFS require that portmap, and nfslock be started, both
> are RPC daemons.
> 
> RPC is used by most modern OS's including Linux, BSD, Solaris/Sun,
> Windows, and others.
> 
> -- 
> <? print(pack("c*", 74,117,115,116,32,/* Tony Evans                  */
>  65,110,111,116,104,101,114,32,80,72, /* Linux/Web Implementation    */
>  80,32,72,97,99,107,101,114,46,10));  /* http://www.phoenixwing.com/ */ ?>
> 
> 
> > for NFS yes,  depends on what you mean by RPC (in what context)
> >
> > --- "Riga, Anthony" <Anthony.Riga at searbrown.com> wrote:
> >> Does linux use Remote procedure calls?
> >>
> >>
> >
> > =====
> > Dave J. Andruczyk
> >
> > __________________________________
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> 


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