How to Disable SELinux

Steps to check if SELinux is enabled or disabled in RHEL 5 :

Try running command getenforce from command prompt in Red hat enterprise Linux :

[root@rhel 5 ~]# getenforce Disabled

OR

[root@rhel 5 ~]# grep SELINUX /etc/selinux/config # SELINUX= can take one of these three values: SELINUX=disabled

Steps to disabled SElinux in RHEL 5

There is file called config in /etc/selinux which is used to enable/disable SElinux in RHEL5:

[root@rhel 5#cat /etc/selinux/config # This file controls the state of SELinux on the system. # SELINUX= can take one of these three values: # enforcing - SELinux security policy is enforced. # permissive - SELinux prints warnings instead of enforcing. # disabled - SELinux is fully disabled. SELINUX=disabled # SELINUXTYPE= type of policy in use. Possible values are: # targeted - Only targeted network daemons are protected. # strict - Full SELinux protection. SELINUXTYPE=targeted # SETLOCALDEFS= Check local definition changes SETLOCALDEFS=0

While installing RHEL 5 linux if you haven't paid much attention then chances are, you probably have missed reading one of the installation window where installation program ask you to enable/disable SElinux. SElinux can run as enforcing or in permissive mode. If in /etc/selinux/config file selinux is set as permissive or enforcing then change it to disabled. You would need to reboot your RHEL 5 server to disable selinux. This change wouldn't work without rebooting your linux box.