Finding out what user Apache is running as?

Question

I want to secure a file upload directory on my server as described beautifully here, but I have one problem before I can follow these instructions. I don't know what user Apache is running as.

I've found a suggestion that you can look in httpd.conf and there will be a "User" line, but there is no such line in my httpd.conf file, so I guess Apache is running as the default user. I can't find out what that is, though.

So, my question is (are):

• how do I find out what the default user is
• do I need to change the default user
• if the answer is yes and I change the default user by editing httpd.conf, is it likely to screw anything up?

Thanks!

----- UPDATE ------

Seems to have been answered here. Sorry, I got told off on StackOverflow and told to post it here, then posted it here, then it got answered on StackOverflow anyway!

Answer 1

ps aux | egrep '(apache|httpd)' typically will show what apache is running as.

Usually you do not need to change the default user, "nobody" or "apache" are typically fine users. As long as its not "root" ;)

edit: more accurate command for catching apache binaries too

Answer 2

I know that this is an old post, but it is still listed as unanswered, so I will make a suggestion. If you can't find which user or group Apache is running as, perhaps try opening the httpd.conf file. There should be an entry there for "User" and "Group". Not only can you see which user Apache is supposed to be running as, but you can change it if you feel the need to do so.

Answer 3

You can include a line of code in your PHP script:

echo exec('whoami');

Answer 4

Or you can check the apache configuration file and look for the owner & group.

Answer 5

• To find out the user, you can simply use ps aux | grep apache while it is running.
• You don't need to, but if Apache is running as root there are security issues.
• Thirdly, changing the user of Apache will change his rights to access some directories. You need to make sure that /var/www (or wherever you have your websites) is accessible to the new user and group.
On the systems I have looked at, apache was always installed using apache:apache (or similar) as user and group, so it should probably already be set like that.

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NOTE: This is the same answer I gave on Stackoverflow.

Answer 6

As suggested by Noyo here:

APACHE_USER=$(ps axho user,comm|grep -E "httpd|apache"|uniq|grep -v "root"|awk 'END {if ($1) print $1}')

Answer 7

You can try the following command:

ps -ef | grep httpd | head -n1 | awk '{print $1}'

Answer 8

ps aux | grep -v root | grep apache | cut -d\  -f1 | sort | uniq