Disabling root user access to WHM

[Ichiban]

Not sure it's possible, but a common unix security measure is to disable remote root logins via ssh and only allow root access via su from wheel group users.

I know WHM operates in a completely different way, but does anyone know if it's possible to do something similar here as well.

1) Can wheel group (or some other WHM spcific group) users login and use WHM in the same way as root?
2) Is there a way to disallow root login to WHM?

 

[KH-Jonathan]

@Ichiban

Unfortunately neither of these things are possible. The closet thing you can do is allow/deny access to WHM overall via /etc/hosts.allow and /etc/hosts.deny. These files can be easily managed via WHM: http://docs.cpanel.net/twiki/bin/view/AllDocumentation/WHMDocs/DenyAccess

 

[Ichiban]

Thanks, Jonathan. Not the answer I was hoping for, but you saved me a ton of Googling and false starts.

 

[Dan]

Hi Ichiban,

You have a couple of good things going for you.

1) SSH is being run on a non-standard port. This in and of itself cuts brute force attacks by a HUGE margin. I never get notifications of brute force attacks via SSH.

2) CSF/LFD should be running on your machine. Any login attempts to your VPS are logged and monitored and if there are any repetitive attempts they will eventually put onto the IP block list.

Hopefully that will help to ease your mind a bit