maggioni.xyz/_posts/2016-07-28-how-to-rickroll-people-launching-rm-rf-on-your-system.html
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---
layout: post
title: 'How to rickroll people that try to run "rm -rf" on your system'
date: 2016-07-28 16:00:00 +0200
categories: linux
---
<strong>
WARNING: The method showed here could not prevent the actual execution of "rm
-rf" if the "UNIX vandal" is clever enough. Proceed at your own risk, and make
backups!
</strong>
<p>
I like Rick Astley late 80's songs, and you can see them here in my Spotify:
</p>
<p>
<img
src="/images/spotify_rickastley.png"
alt="My Spotify with a bunch of Rick Astley songs"
/>
</p>
<p>
I like rickrolling people too, especially if they are trying to delete my
entire
<code>/home</code> directory or, even worse, <code>/</code>. Since I learned
how to use the <code>alias</code> built-in, I wanted a way to prevent that
random people tinkering with my laptop (that I may forget to lock) could
delete potentially important stuff, just for fun or boredom.
</p>
<p>
The method that I will show will lock any <code>rm</code> command runned in
both recursive and force mode, so <code>rm -rf</code>,
<code>rm -f -r</code> and <code>rm -r --force</code> are all blocked, even if
they are runned with <code>sudo</code>. I am going to alias the rm command in
<code>/etc/profile</code>, <code>/etc/bash.bashrc</code> and in
<code>/etc/zsh/zshrc</code> (I am a zsh user) so that the rickroll will be
possible from all users, even root and the ones with a brand new
<code>.bashrc</code> or <code>.zshrc</code>. Here is the code I appended to
those files:
</p>
<p>
{% highlight bash %}
alias rm=/bin/rmAlias
# this enables aliases in sudo, see http://askubuntu.com/q/22037/
alias sudo='sudo '
{% endhighlight %}
</p>
<p>
Since <code>alias</code> is not able to control the flags of the aliases (see
<a
href="http://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/50963/how-do-i-add-a-flag-to-an-alias"
>here</a
>, we are going to redirect each call of <code>rm</code> to
<code>/bin/rmAlias</code>, that would run the command if it is safe. I did not
use a function because it is a bit tricky to make that work with
<code>sudo</code>. So, let's see the code I put in <code>rmAlias</code>:
</p>
<p>
{% highlight bash %}
#!/bin/bash
# Rickroll whoever tries to desert this system, even root.
# To achieve this, set the appropriate aliases in /etc/profile and others.
# Video played when rickrolling: it's just Never Gonna Give You Up on my system,
# but be free to customize this!
ROLLVIDEO=/opt/anti-rm/serious-video.mkv
rickroll() {
echo "Never gonna desert this system..."
xdg-open $ROLLVIDEO 2>&1 & exit 0
}
while getopts ":rf-" opt; do
# Prevent '--force' to be detected as -r and -f
if [ "$opt" = "-" ]; then
OPTIND=$OPTIND+1
continue
fi
if [ "$opt" = "r" ] || [ "$opt" = "f" ]; then
if [ "$tmp" = "" ]; then
tmp=$opt
continue
elif [ "$tmp" != "$opt" ]; then
rickroll
fi
fi
done
for var in "$@" do
if [[ "$var" = "--force" && "$tmp" = "r" ]]; then
rickroll
fi
done
# If it's safe, just run rm
/bin/rm "$@"
exit $?
{% endhighlight %}
</p>
<p>
It may look messy to a <em>UNIX</em> guy more experienced than me, but it
works. The <code>getopts</code> built-in sees if both the <code>-r</code> and
the <code>-f</code> flags are used and, if so, it starts
<code>rickroll()</code>, which opens with <code>xdg-open</code> that amazing
clip from <em>RickAstleyVEVO</em>. From line 30 and below, the script checks
if the <code>--force</code> flag is used instead of <code>-f</code>.
</p>
<p>Let's give execution permissions to the script we have just created:</p>
<p>{% highlight bash %}chmod +x /bin/rmAlias{% endhighlight %}</p>
<p>
Restart your shell, and enjoy. If you want to test safely, I suggest trying to
run <code>rm -rf</code> with no folders or a nonexistant one, since this
script stops even these commands.
</p>
<p>
If you want even more security, you can rename this script to
<code>/bin/rm</code> and move the original one in some other place, getting
rid of all the aliases. I prefer the solution above because it's tidier: you
haven't to move anything. In fact, this could be just an AUR package...
</p>