What are the users in mac HD "system" "wheel" and "everybody" and what does their privileges entail?

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Level 1

8 points

What are the users in mac HD "system" "wheel" and "everybody" and what does their privileges entail?

Hi,

I was looking at the Info on my Mac HD hard drive (OS X Yosemite Ver. 10.10.3), and I see that there are three users listed here; system, wheel, and everyone. I only have one user on my machine so I disabled everyone so that it had no access but just before I exited I saw a message that said "You have no access" directly below the Sharing & Permissions title, so I emediatly changed it back to read only.

So my questions are: what are the three users, why do I need them, what do they do for me, and what permissions should they have to keep my machine the most secure?

Thanks in advance

MacBook Pro (13-inch Mid 2009), OS X Yosemite (10.10.3)

Posted on May 1, 2015 11:02 AM

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Answer 1

Bigape4

Level 1

12 points

May 2, 2016 10:36 PM in response to Linc Davis

Hi Linc,

If these permission are normal, and I paid to buy this computer that I now own. I would like to know what these permissions are in detail. I can't seem to find much through my research efforts, but am very curious. My El Capitan operating system seems to be very buggy these days. Thanks a bunch for your help level 10!

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Answer 2

rkaufmann87

Level 10

140,370 points

May 1, 2015 11:13 AM in response to deven09

Screen shots might be helpful to describe what you are seeing.

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Answer 3

Old Toad

Level 10

207,367 points

May 1, 2015 11:23 AM in response to deven09

This might answer some of your questions: OS X Yosemite: Set up users on your Mac. "Everyone" should have at least Read Only enabled. As for the Groups see the document I linked to.

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Answer 4

deven09 Author

Level 1

8 points

May 1, 2015 11:36 AM in response to rkaufmann87

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Answer 5

deven09 Author

Level 1

8 points

May 1, 2015 11:40 AM in response to deven09

It's not much to look at but these three entities; system, wheel, and everyone, are all givin some permissions to my hard drive by default and I am just trying to find out why. I have looked at countless forums that describe problems people have with deleting some of these but I havnt found their purpose... yet.

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Answer 6

May 1, 2015 11:53 AM in response to deven09

If you do a Google search, you will find your answers, 659,000 hits. Research the ones you like the best.

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Answer 7

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,541 points

May 1, 2015 5:18 PM in response to deven09

Those permissions are normal. Never change the permissions of any file unless you have a good reason, which you almost certainly never will.

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Answer 8

chroot

Level 4

1,102 points

May 3, 2016 12:51 AM in response to Bigape4

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wheel_(Unix_term)

OS X is a Unix based operating system and below Finder and the Dock you will find everything you would expect from a Unix platform. Everybody isn't a group but Wheel and System are groups you'll find in many Unix-based and Unix-like operating systems.

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