If you maintain a MySQL database, you understand the importance of security. This article covers that topic in detail. The first of several parts, it is excerpted from chapter 12 of the MySQL 5.0 Certification Guide, written by Paul Dubois et al. (Sams, 2005; ISBN: 0672328127).
Before you can consider a MySQL installation ready for general use, several security-related issues must be considered and addressed:
If you're running MySQL on a multiuser system, you should protect the directories and files that are part of the installation against unauthorized access by users who are not responsible for database administration. To do this, set up a dedicated login account to use for administering MySQL and give that account ownership of the relevant files. An additional benefit of setting up this account is that you can use it to run the MySQL server, rather than running the server from the Unix root account. A server that has the privileges of the root login account has more filesystem access than necessary and constitutes a security risk.
The initial MySQL accounts that are set up during the MySQL installation procedure have no passwords. Some of these accounts have full privileges for server access and should be assigned passwords to prevent unauthorized clients from connecting to the server and gaining complete access to it.
The directories and files of a MySQL installation can be protected by changing their ownership and access permissions before running the server, but setting passwords for the MySQL root accounts can be done only while the server is running. Consequently, before starting the server and setting passwords, you should take any actions necessary to protect MySQL-related portions of the filesystem. If you set the passwords first, before protecting the files in which the grant tables are stored, it's possible for someone with direct filesystem access on the server host to replace the grant tables. This compromises your MySQL installation and undoes the effect of setting the passwords.
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