pam_authenticate(3PAM) pam_authenticate(3PAM)
NAME
pam_authenticate - perform authentication within the PAM framework
SYNOPSIS
cc [ flag ... ] file ... -lpam [ library ... ]
#include <security/pam_appl.h>
int pam_authenticate(pam_handle_t *pamh, int flags);
The pam_authenticate() function is called to authenticate the current user. The user is usually required to enter a password or similar
authentication token depending upon the authentication service configured within the system. The user in question should have been speci-
fied by a prior call to pam_start() or pam_set_item().
The following flags may be set in the flags field:
PAM_SILENT Authentication service should not generate any messages.
PAM_DISALLOW_NULL_AUTHTOK The authentication service should return PAM_AUTH_ERR if the user has a null authentication token.
Upon successful completion, PAM_SUCCESS is returned. In addition to the error return values described in pam(3PAM), the following values
may be returned:
PAM_AUTH_ERR Authentication failure.
PAM_CRED_INSUFFICIENT Cannot access authentication data due to insufficient credentials.
PAM_AUTHINFO_UNAVAIL Underlying authentication service cannot retrieve authentication information.
PAM_USER_UNKNOWN User not known to the underlying authentication module.
PAM_MAXTRIES An authentication service has maintained a retry count which has been reached. No further retries should be
attempted.
See attributes(5) for description of the following attributes:
+-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
| ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
+-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
|Interface Stability | Stable |
+-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
|MT-Level |MT-Safe with exceptions |
+-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
pam(3PAM), pam_open_session(3PAM), pam_set_item(3PAM), pam_setcred(3PAM), pam_start(3PAM), libpam(3LIB), attributes(5)
In the case of authentication failures due to an incorrect username or password, it is the responsibility of the application to retry
pam_authenticate() and to maintain the retry count. An authentication service module may implement an internal retry count and return an
error PAM_MAXTRIES if the module does not want the application to retry.
If the PAM framework cannot load the authentication module, then it will return PAM_ABORT. This indicates a serious failure, and the
application should not attempt to retry the authentication.
For security reasons, the location of authentication failures is hidden from the user. Thus, if several authentication services are
stacked and a single service fails, pam_authenticate() requires that the user re-authenticate each of the services.
A null authentication token in the authentication database will result in successful authentication unless PAM_DISALLOW_NULL_AUTHTOK was
specified. In such cases, there will be no prompt to the user to enter an authentication token.
The interfaces in libpam are MT-Safe only if each thread within the multithreaded application uses its own PAM handle.
27 Jan 2005 pam_authenticate(3PAM)