Securing Sys to prevent him from getting Remote Control App installed

arch_fuz · 2026-02-08 20:20:46

Hi.
I need to protect my father from being tricked again. He was before on a Windows System when "Microsoft Support" called him and he followed their instructions. Bank detected something was going on and stop a transfer of 50K in last minute. I switched him to Linux and it works all good. I thought everything is fine now...

He is old and he is easy to manipulate and the Hackers seem to know it. Now I found a current version of anydesk.tar.gz in his Download folder. I saw that this software can be installed and run as a regular user. My father's user has shell access. I can not see that any installation of the app has happend so far.

I am afraid of that they trick him into installing a browser plugin or some remote control app like anydesk.

Do you have an advice what can be done best to avoid this? I won't get him from doing online banking and playing around with the computer.

Thanks,
_fuz

seth · 2026-02-08 21:29:30

https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Security#Mount_options
But he's still gonna be able to run "bash -c evilscript.sh" and browser plugins typically don't require execution permissions - you're looking for enterprise profiles here, https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Firefo … e_policies

Lone_Wolf · 2026-02-09 12:23:33

maybe Firefox in kiosk mode is enough for them ?

schard · 2026-02-09 13:42:55

Maybe instead of focusing on the technical aspect, you should also keep the social aspect in mind.
If your dad wants to use online banking and tinkering with the computer, he maybe should attend a computer course, ideally one for senior citizens.
No amount of technical limitations can prevent compromising your own user account via PEBKAC (except for maybe a completely read-only kiosk system as suggested, which would prevent tinkering with the PC on the other hand).

seth · 2026-02-09 15:28:54

He is old and he is easy to manipulate

That's not fixed with a computer course - the problem isn't that he doesn't know how to run a shell script, the problem is that he will follow malicious instructions to do so.
The sensible thing to do is to take away the car… errr… computer keys and offer to do this together - but even in shouldland™ your average dad isn't gonna hear any of this nonsense

It's a complete perversion of the label, but struck me that https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Parental_control is probably useful here.

Arch Linux

#1 2026-02-08 20:20:46

Securing Sys to prevent him from getting Remote Control App installed

#2 2026-02-08 21:29:30

Re: Securing Sys to prevent him from getting Remote Control App installed

#3 2026-02-09 12:23:33

Re: Securing Sys to prevent him from getting Remote Control App installed

#4 2026-02-09 13:42:55

Re: Securing Sys to prevent him from getting Remote Control App installed

#5 2026-02-09 15:28:54

Re: Securing Sys to prevent him from getting Remote Control App installed

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