{"id":128,"date":"2006-05-09T16:09:32","date_gmt":"2006-05-09T21:09:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bitpost.com\/news\/2006\/05\/09\/http-basic-authentication-rocks-and-sucks\/"},"modified":"2006-05-10T13:01:47","modified_gmt":"2006-05-10T18:01:47","slug":"http-basic-authentication-rocks-and-sucks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bitpost.com\/news\/2006\/http-basic-authentication-rocks-and-sucks\/","title":{"rendered":"HTTP Basic Authentication rocks and sucks"},"content":{"rendered":"

I recently used Apache 2.0’s HTTP Basic Authentication (via mod_auth_dbm) to restrict access to portions of my website. It’s simple as pie.<\/p>\n

Use this block of directives in the directory you want to restrict:<\/p>\n

\n
AuthType Basic
\nAuthName “secret area”
\nAuthDBMUserFile \/home\/me\/secret_users
\nAuthDBMGroupFile \/home\/me\/secret_users
\nAuthDBMAuthoritative on
\nRequire valid-user<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Then set up a cute little users database with the “htdbm” tool:<\/p>\n

\n
cd \/home\/me<\/div>\n
htdbm -c secret_users me
\n(enter password)
\nhtdbm secret_users another_user
\n(enter password)<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The main problem: you really can’t “logout” once you use HTTP Basic Authentication to get access to a restricted website. This thread<\/a> explains why (along with some tomfoolery to hack around it).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I recently used Apache 2.0’s HTTP Basic Authentication (via mod_auth_dbm) to restrict access to portions of my website. It’s simple as pie.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[5,4,10,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-128","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-linux-projects","category-projects","category-tricks-tips-tools","category-websites"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t