Did you run ‘mysql_secure_installation’ after Installing MySQL? It helps Secure MySQL

Updated on September 3, 2017

The MySQL database package comes with an automated secure installation script called “mysql_secure_installation”. It’s advised to run this script soon after the installation of MySQL database, especially on a production machine. The obvious reason is, it improves security of the database.

By default MySQL,

  • allows anonymous user logins
  • ‘root’ user is not secured with a password
  • ‘root’ user is allowed to connect from a remote machine
  • during the installation, ‘test’ database is created with an access granted to every user.

Advantages of running ‘mysql_secure_installation’ script:

  • Allows you to remove anonymous user logins
  • Allows you to set a secure password for the ‘root’ user.
  • Restricts ‘root’ user from connecting remotely
  • Removes ‘test’ database created during the installation, as it does nothing in the production environment.

mysql secure how to

Execute ‘mysql_secure_installation’ after MySQL Installation

It’s simple and fast. All you need to do is, just run the command, read the steps carefully and hit enter!

# mysql_secure_installation
Enter current password for root (enter for none):
 Set root password? [Y/n]
 New password:
 Re-enter new password:
 Password updated successfully!
 Reloading privilege tables..
 ... Success!
Remove anonymous users? [Y/n] Y
 ... Success!
Disallow root login remotely? [Y/n] Y
 ... Success!
Remove test database and access to it? [Y/n] Y
 - Dropping test database...
 ... Success!
 - Removing privileges on test database...
 ... Success!
Reloading the privilege tables will ensure that all changes made so far
 will take effect immediately.
 Reload privilege tables now? [Y/n] Y
 ... Success!

That’s it! You have taken a first step towards securing MySQL installation. Happy DBing!

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