sewhoami reports all users as root on AIX

Products

• CA Privileged Access Manager - Server Control (PAMSC)

Issue/Introduction

After login as User1 the user cannot use sesu. checking the sewhoami command the user is idenditified as root.

User1@host:/staff sewhoami -a
root
ACEE Contents
  User's Name             : root
  ACEE's Handle           : 1
  Group Connections Table:
<Empty>
Categories              : <None>
Profile Group           : <None>
Security Label          : <None>
User's Audit Mode       : Interactive
User's Security Level   : 0
Source Terminal         : <Unknown>
Process Count for ACEE  : 140
User's Mode             : Admin Auditor 
ACEE's Creation Time    : Tue Mar 31 09:07:40 2026

Cause

Starting with OpenSSH 9.9p1 on AIX, the sshd daemon is split into a listener binary (sshd) and a per-session binary (sshd-session) to enhance security and efficiency. The sshd-session binary is spawned on-demand for each new client connection, while the main sshd process handles standby listener duties. This causes the issue with the identification of the user since here was no loginappl set for /usr/sbin/sshd-session.

Resolution

The default LOGINAPPL resource has been updated in PAMSC CP08. For all existing AIX installations before CP08 you can simply add a new LOGINAPPL for sshd-session.

ex. pamsc>. nr LOGINAPPL SSH-SESS loginpath(/usr/sbin/sshd-session) loginflag(pamlogin) defaccess(x)