GSHADOW(5) File Formats and Conversions GSHADOW(5)
NAME
gshadow - shadowed group file
DESCRIPTION
/etc/gshadow contains the shadowed information for group accounts.
This file must not be readable by regular users if password security is
to be maintained.
Each line of this file contains the following colon-separated fields:
group name
It must be a valid group name, which exist on the system.
encrypted password
Refer to crypt(3) for details on how this string is interpreted.
If the password field contains some string that is not a valid
result of crypt(3), for instance ! or *, users will not be able to
use a unix password to access the group (but group members do not
need the password).
The password is used when a user who is not a member of the group
wants to gain the permissions of this group (see newgrp(1)).
This field may be empty, in which case only the group members can
gain the group permissions.
A password field which starts with an exclamation mark means that
the password is locked. The remaining characters on the line
represent the password field before the password was locked.
This password supersedes any password specified in /etc/group.
administrators
It must be a comma-separated list of user names.
Administrators can change the password or the members of the group.
Administrators also have the same permissions as the members (see
below).
members
It must be a comma-separated list of user names.
Members can access the group without being prompted for a password.
You should use the same list of users as in /etc/group.
FILES
/etc/group
Group account information.
/etc/gshadow
Secure group account information.
SEE ALSO
gpasswd(5), group(5), grpck(8), grpconv(8), newgrp(1).
shadow-utils 4.8.1 02/07/2020 GSHADOW(5)