Need security tips for a school comp

[Mr.Grim]

Hey everyone, i'm setting up a Gentoo computer at the high school I work at and would like to know what I could do to make it as secure as possible, because there will be a ton of high school kids trying all they can to break it.
Anyone know what kind of steps I need to take?

[armandocerna]

To start off two words.. Optical Mouse. Regular mouse balls tend to not last long. I would also try to lock the case away so it can't be accessed. As far as software goes just use gnome or kde and don't put a link to anything they shouldn't be using.

[nightblade]

1 - emerge only necessary packages. Don't leave around useless daemons to play with

2 - emerge iptables, and set up a policy paranoid enough to block unwanted traffic

3 - keep the software constantly updated

4 - install the grsecurity patches (http://www.grsecurity.net). Your box will be MUCH harder to exploit (5cr1pt k1dd13z won't have any success in running the latest exploit they have just downloaded)

5 - run Bastille (it's in the portage tree). It's an interactive program that helps you harden your linux box from ground up (firewall rules, unnecessary services, suid progs, ...)

And that will keep away the 98% of the bad guys out there
_________________
In God we trust. All the others must provide a valid X.509 certificate

[lwithers]

And, of course, make sure that you never leave consoles logged in and always lock the X screen when you're away!

You probably want to set up your iptables to reject all input traffic (except perhaps on ssh) and all ICMP input traffic.

[nielchiano]

[Mr.Grim]