Why is sudo command asking for root password in RHEL/CentOs 6 / RHEL/CentOS 7?

In this blog I will try to keep my self strictly to the point of issue. You might have noticed that at times when you try to execute a command using sudo user it prompts for root password.

Solution:

For Red Hat 6 and older variants:

You can see the below line in your /etc/sudoers file

Defaults targetpw

[deepak@golinuxhub ~]$ sudo /etc/init.d/sshd restart
[sudo] password for root:

As per this configuration ask for the password of the target user i.e. root.

# visudo
# Defaults targetpw

Save and exit the file

Now the sudo will prompt for the password of the respective user

[deepak@golinuxhub ~]$ sudo /etc/init.d/sshd restart
[sudo] password for deepak:

For Red Hat 7

For disabling the root authentication prompt create /etc/polkit-1/localauthority/50-local.d/disable-passwords.pkla with below contents:

[description]
Identity=unix-user:username
Action=*
ResultActive=yes

Replace the variable highlighted with blue suitable to your requirement

For example:

[GoLinuxHub]
Identity=unix-user:deepak
Action=*
ResultActive=yes

Now you can re-run the sudo command as normal user, it should prompt you for the target user password