Editing Bash (Unix shell) (section)

=== Root Scripts ===
Running any shell scripts as the root user has, for years, been widely criticized as poor security practice. One commonly given reason is that, when a script is executed as root, the negative effects of any bugs in a script would be magnified by root's elevated privileges.

One common example: a script contains the command, <code>rm -rf ${dir}/</code>, but the variable <code>$dir</code> is left undefined. In Linux, if the script was executed by a regular user, the shell would attempt to execute the command <code>rm -rf /</code> as a regular user, and the command would fail. However, if the script was executed by the root user, then the command would likely succeed and the filesystem would be erased.

It is recommended to use <code>sudo</code> on a per-command basis instead.