How to break root password in CentOS RHEL 8

Question

Hi Guys,

I have my CentOS virtual machine in my virtual box. But I forgot my root password. How can I change my root password?

Answer 1

Hi@akhtar,

• Reboot the system and interrupt the boot loader sequence by pressing any key.

• Move the cursor to the entry that needs to be booted.

• Press e to edit the selected entry. Move the cursor to the kernel command line (the line that starts with linux, it looks like the below output.

• Append rd.break options in the end of the kernel command line. This will break just before control is handed from the initramfs to the actual system.

• Press Ctrl+x and reboot the system. At this point, a root shell will be presented, with the root file system for the actual system mounted read-only on /sysroot.

• Remount /sysroot as read-write.

$ switch_root:/# mount -o remount,rw /sysroot

• Switch into a chroot jail, where /sysroot is treated as the root of the file system tree.

switch_root:/# chroot /sysroot
sh-4.4# 

• Set a new root password here.

# passwd root

• Make sure that all unlabeled files (including /etc/shadow at this point) get relabeled during boot.

sh-4.2# touch /.autorelabel

• Type exit twice. The first will exit the chroot jail, and the second will exit the initramfs debug shell.

Hope this will solve your task.