Fork bombing a Linux machine as a non-root user

[Felipe Alfaro Solana]

On 20 Mar 2005, at 19:46, Les Mikesell wrote:

> Well, OK - don't get hacked.  A fork bomb is one of the least
> destructive things a hacker could do once in. Keep your system
> updated and you are unlikely to have a vulnerability exploited.
> Keep your password to yourself, don't write it down, and don't
> use it over public unencrypted connections.

I agree... a fork-bomb is a local attack, which is far more powerful 
than remote attacks, although fork-bomb can only deny service. Once an 
attacker gets local access to your machine, you're in a very bad 
position. On point of defense-in-depth is to keep bad guys from gaining 
local access.

Anyways, I think quotas should be enforced on nearly every system, 
except maybe workstations.