Question

I’m setting up a lamp server on my android phone, and i didn’t managed to get mysql working with the default settings. i had to change the user to root in the my.cnf.
So i’m curious about the dangers of running mysql under the root user.

Answer 1

running MySQL as root, means everything the server does is also done as root (obvious). Especially if you happen to make a mistake, this can cause problems:

• if you mis configure the mysql logfile to /etc/passwd, then that important file will probably be overwritten (a normal user cant do that).
• root usually as some amount of disk system reserved (per filesystem), thus you can easier make the partition full as root.
• code injection: if you have scripts running (for backup of the now root owned files) than you need higher privileges there, and again any mistake might have a bigger impact.