How To Let Sudo Insult You When You Type the Wrong Password

This is a completely useless post, but it’s possible to configure sudo to return insults instead of the default error message when you type the wrong password.

To enable this feature, edit /etc/sudoers (with visudo for example) and change the line:

to :

Open a terminal windows as a normal user, type a command with sudo and input the wrong password. Here are a few examples:

$ sudo bash
[sudo] password for testman: xxx
Are you on drugs?

[sudo] password for testman: xxx
Maybe if you used more than just two fingers…

[sudo] password for testman: xxx
Listen, burrito brains, I don’t have time to listen to this trash.

[sudo] password for testman: xxx
You silly, twisted boy you.

[sudo] password for testman: xxx
What, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what?

[sudo] password for testman: xxx
You do that again and see what happens…

[sudo] password for testman: xxx
Where did you learn to type?

[sudo] password for testman: xxx
Your mind just hasn’t been the same since the electro-shock, has it?

[sudo] password for testman: xxx
It can only be attributed to human error.

[sudo] password for testman: xxx
That’s something I cannot allow to happen.

[sudo] password for testman: xxx
We’ll all be murdered in our beds!

This trick works with Ubuntu 12.04 and sudo 1.8.3, but does not  work with Fedora 16. The insults are apparently only available in English even if your system is set to another language.

Source: Tuxplanet.

Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft)

Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.

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