auditd(8)

NAME

   auditd - The Linux Audit daemon

SYNOPSIS

   auditd [-f] [-l] [-n] [-s disable|enable|nochange]

DESCRIPTION

   auditd  is  the  userspace component to the Linux Auditing System. It's
   responsible for writing audit records to the disk. Viewing the logs  is
   done  with  the  ausearch  or aureport utilities. Configuring the audit
   system or loading rules is  done  with  the  auditctl  utility.  During
   startup,  the  rules in /etc/audit/audit.rules are read by auditctl and
   loaded into the  kernel.  Alternately,  there  is  also  an  augenrules
   program  that  reads  rules located in /etc/audit/rules.d/ and compiles
   them into an  audit.rules  file.  The  audit  daemon  itself  has  some
   configuration  options  that  the admin may wish to customize. They are
   found in the auditd.conf file.

OPTIONS

   -f     leave the audit daemon in the foreground for debugging. Messages
          also go to stderr rather than the audit log.

   -l     allow the audit daemon to follow symlinks for config files.

   -n     no fork. This is useful for running off of inittab or systemd.

   -s=ENABLE_STATE
          specify  when starting if auditd should change the current value
          for the kernel enabled flag. Valid values for  ENABLE_STATE  are
          "disable", "enable" or "nochange". The default is to enable (and
          disable when auditd terminates). The value of the  enabled  flag
          may  be  changed  during  the lifetime of auditd using 'auditctl
          -e'.

SIGNALS

   SIGHUP causes auditd to reconfigure. This means  that  auditd  re-reads
          the  configuration  file. If there are no syntax errors, it will
          proceed to implement the requested changes. If  the  reconfigure
          is successful, a DAEMON_CONFIG event is recorded in the logs. If
          not   successful,    error    handling    is    controlled    by
          space_left_action,   admin_space_left_action,  disk_full_action,
          and disk_error_action parameters in auditd.conf.

   SIGTERM
          caused auditd to discontinue processing audit  events,  write  a
          shutdown audit event, and exit.

   SIGUSR1
          causes  auditd  to  immediately rotate the logs. It will consult
          the max_log_size_action to see if it should  keep  the  logs  or
          not.

   SIGUSR2
          causes  auditd  to  attempt  to  resume logging. This is usually
          needed after logging has been suspended.

FILES

   /etc/audit/auditd.conf - configuration file for audit daemon

   /etc/audit/audit.rules - audit rules to be loaded at startup

   /etc/audit/rules.d/ - directory holding individual sets of rules to  be
   compiled into one file by augenrules.

NOTES

   A  boot  param  of audit=1 should be added to ensure that all processes
   that run before the audit daemon starts is marked as auditable  by  the
   kernel. Not doing that will make a few processes impossible to properly
   audit.

   The audit daemon can receive audit events from other audit daemons  via
   the  audisp-remote  audispd plugin. The audit daemon may be linked with
   tcp_wrappers to control which machines can  connect.  If  this  is  the
   case, you can add an entry to hosts.allow and deny.

SEE ALSO

   auditd.conf(5),   audispd(8),  ausearch(8),  aureport(8),  auditctl(8),
   augenrules(8), audit.rules(7).

AUTHOR

   Steve Grubb

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