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AUDITD(8)               System Administration Utilities              AUDITD(8)

NAME
       auditd - The Linux Audit daemon
SYNOPSIS
       auditd [-f] [-l] [-n] [-s disable|enable|nochange] [-c <config_dir>]
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  pro-
       gram  that reads rules located in /etc/audit/rules.d/ and compiles them
       into an audit.rules file. The audit daemon itself has  some  configura-
       tion  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'.
       -c     Specify alternate config file directory.  Note  that  this  same
              directory   will   be   passed   to  the  dispatcher.  (default:
              /etc/audit/)
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_file_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

Red Hat                            Sept 2013                         AUDITD(8)