Plugable Authentication Modules. This is what Linux uses to kind of centralize the question of authentication. So if an application on a Linux machine needs you to verify sort of who you are to it for any reason, whether you're requesting to sign on to another server somewhere, or whether you're asking to do something that you maybe shouldn't usually be able to do on the system, then instead of it coming up, you know, the developer of that application coming up with their own way of authenticating and storing and hashing a password and all these other things that they would have to do, they just plug into PAM. And they ask PAM whether you are who you say you are. PAM can check things like your login credentials. Did you provide, you know, are you, is there a record of you having logged in? And if so, how long ago? Is there a, you know, using the system clock, is there a need for you to provide reinforcement that you are who you say you are, like another password entry, and so on. And (3/53)
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