Package: libpam-modules
Version: 1.5.2-6
Severity: minor
Tags: patch
Dear developer,
Since Bookworm, `adduser` by default creates system users without a home
directory, and the manual page states:
"If no home directory is specified, the default home directory for a new
system user is /nonexistent. This directory should never exist on any
Debian system, and adduser will never create it automatically."
Unfortunately, pam_mkhomedir.so does create such a home directory if a
system user opens a session (in my case, a system user existing solely
to create SSH tunnels from a system to another).
A simple workaround is to jump over the pam_mkhomedir.so call if the
home directory matches "/nonexistent".
Here is a simple patch to accomplish this.
The patch suppresses wrongful behavior and seems quite harmless to me,
so a proposed-update to Trixie would be appreciated.
Regards,
--
Raphaël Halimi
From 96d9df7a86c646052961e936ffa10851309d8ed0 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: =?UTF-8?q?Rapha=C3=ABl=20Halimi?= <[email protected]>
Date: Sun, 7 Jun 2026 19:14:20 +0200
Subject: [PATCH] d/pam-configs/mkhomedir: do not create /nonexistent
---
debian/pam-configs/mkhomedir | 1 +
1 file changed, 1 insertion(+)
diff --git a/debian/pam-configs/mkhomedir b/debian/pam-configs/mkhomedir
index 9c27980a..55c6b1d3 100644
--- a/debian/pam-configs/mkhomedir
+++ b/debian/pam-configs/mkhomedir
@@ -4,4 +4,5 @@ Priority: 0
Session-Type: Additional
Session-Interactive-Only: yes
Session:
+ [success=1 default=ignore] pam_succeed_if.so quiet home = /nonexistent
optional pam_mkhomedir.so
--
2.53.0
