commit 7d5dcd2358df55353eed94a0e84b77bb3597634e Author: J. Bruce Fields Date: Fri Mar 27 13:11:28 2020 -0400 exports man page: warn about subdirectory exports Subdirectory exports have a number of problems which have been poorly documented. Signed-off-by: J. Bruce Fields Signed-off-by: Steve Dickson diff --git a/utils/exportfs/exports.man b/utils/exportfs/exports.man index e3a16f6b..1d171849 100644 --- a/utils/exportfs/exports.man +++ b/utils/exportfs/exports.man @@ -494,6 +494,33 @@ export entry for .B /home/joe in the example section below, which maps all requests to uid 150 (which is supposedly that of user joe). + +.SS Subdirectory Exports + +Normally you should only export only the root of a filesystem. The NFS +server will also allow you to export a subdirectory of a filesystem, +however, this has drawbacks: + +First, it may be possible for a malicious user to access files on the +filesystem outside of the exported subdirectory, by guessing filehandles +for those other files. The only way to prevent this is by using the +.IR no_subtree_check +option, which can cause other problems. + +Second, export options may not be enforced in the way that you would +expect. For example, the +.IR security_label +option will not work on subdirectory exports, and if nested subdirectory +exports change the +.IR security_label +or +.IR sec= +options, NFSv4 clients will normally see only the options on the parent +export. Also, where security options differ, a malicious client may use +filehandle-guessing attacks to access the files from one subdirectory +using the options from another. + + .SS Extra Export Tables After reading .I /etc/exports