Two of the most important Linux utilities are being rewritten in Rust to provide greater memory safety for the critical functionality they provide.

Linux is a mult-user operating system with a root account that has ultimate access to the system. When a normal user needs to perform a task that would normally require root access, they can use sudo or su to temporarily elevate their privileges. This is a much safer option than logging into the root account directly.

According to Phoronix, both utilities are being rewritten in Rust to take advantage of the memory safety features inherent in the language. According to memorysafety.org, the “work is being done by a joint team from Ferrous Systems and Tweede Golf with generous support from Amazon Web Services.”

Because sudo was originally written in C, it “has experienced many vulnerabilities related to memory safety issues.” The rewrite in Rust should bring welcome improvements and security.