{"id":3959,"date":"2018-03-11T00:00:28","date_gmt":"2018-03-10T15:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.catracing.org\/hendrb\/?p=3959"},"modified":"2018-03-10T12:32:26","modified_gmt":"2018-03-10T03:32:26","slug":"technical-macos-x-security-part-1-boot-security","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.catracing.org\/hendrb\/technical-macos-x-security-part-1-boot-security\/","title":{"rendered":"Technical: macOS X Security – Part 1 – Boot Security"},"content":{"rendered":"

Technical: macOS X Security <\/span><\/h1>\n

Part 1 \u2013 Boot Security<\/span><\/h1>\n

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 \"\" Technical blogs, oh how I loathe thee.  While one hand they are fun to research, and I do enjoy delving more and more into the inner workings of macOS X, To me these posts feel the most like actual work.  I do not get the enjoyment of taking photographs like I do for travel articles.  Or put myself in a well deserved food coma after reviewing a resturant.  It\u2019s just mostly research, typing, and the screen shots that go with the article<\/p>\n

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They do provide a service to my readers and remain in the top viewed list continuously, so in there in itself is my reward!  Now that I have my belly aching out of the way, let\u2019s start a new technical series on Brent\u2019s World, macOS X Security, which will be a multi part blog on keeping your Mac, and your data safe!  We will begin with the boot loader, utilities available on the recovery partition and the vulnerabilities they impose and how to protect your system from these vulnerabilities.  Subsequent posts will deal with user accounts (Local, and network), file system permissions and access control lists (ACLs), drive and folder encryption, and ending with the sharing options offered with macOS X what they do, and how to lock them down.<\/p>\n

So after that long winded preamble, lets dive into the heart of the matter.<\/p>\n

Security, security threats, vulnerabilities, hackers, and bad actors.  This is something we hear about daily but as Mac users, especially standalone (devices not part of an enterprise environment.) is something we really take no notice of, these happen to other people, people who own PCs.  If we do anything at all we install an antivirus package such as Sophos and call it a day!  What if I told you there are many more threats out there then just viruses, worms, or ransomware?  Those risks raise exponentially if you are a Macbook or Macbook Pro user, simply because if you lose physical control of the device the thief can attempt to gain access at his leisure.  \u201cSo, my device is password protected!\u201d  What if I told you, it is possible to get access to all your data and I don\u2019t even need to enter your password, or that I could change your password from the recovery partition built into your Mac? Let\u2019s take a look at some scenarios, starting from the simple and moving into the more complex.<\/p>\n

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  • The boot loader.\"\"<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    Rebooting or starting a Mac with the option key depressed will invoke the Apple Boot Loader. This will allow me to boot off an external drive such as a thumb drive or external hard drive.  Great for troubleshooting, imaging the operating system, or installing the OS if you have completely replaced the system drive.  It also opens up your system to several vulnerabilities such as allowing an unauthorized individual the ability to take an image of the system drive, or simply copy the data to an external drive<\/p>\n

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    • The recovery partition.
      \n           Holding down Command \u2013 R after the startup chime will invoke loading the recovery partition, this is a hidden partition that contains a limited, bootable version of mac OS X that will allow you to set an OpenFirmware password (More about this later), access a shell via the terminal.app, Reinstall Mac OS X from a Time Machine backup, Reinstall Mac OS X, and Disk Utility. The recovery partition utilities are very useful when used for their intended purposes, but if left unsecured, by not setting an OpenFirmware password allow several holes into your system.  Let me demonstrate.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

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