Raspberry Pi OS tightens sudo

Raspberry Pi OS 6.2 now asks for a password before `sudo` on new installs, ending the old default of passwordless administrator commands. (theregister.com) Raspberry Pi released version 6.2 on Tuesday, April 14, 2026, as the second update to its Debian Trixie-based operating system. Existing installations are unchanged unless users switch the setting themselves. (heise.de) `sudo` is the Linux command that lets a regular account run a single task with root privileges, and Raspberry Pi OS had long let that happen without a password. In 6.2, the password stays cached for five minutes after a successful entry, so repeated admin commands do not prompt every time. (heise.de) The change targets a basic risk: if someone gets access to a Raspberry Pi session, passwordless `sudo` lets them jump straight to administrator control. Raspberry Pi said stronger defaults come with tradeoffs, and The Register reported mixed user reaction on the first day. (theregister.com) That tradeoff lands hardest on hobbyist and headless setups, where users often automate maintenance with `sudo apt update` and similar commands. Raspberry Pi’s own documentation still tells users to run `sudo apt update` and `sudo apt full-upgrade` regularly to keep systems current. (raspberrypi.com) Users who want the old behavior back can disable the “Admin Password” option in the System tab of Control Centre, or change it through `raspi-config`. The new default applies in both the terminal and the desktop environment. (heise.de) Raspberry Pi has been moving away from assuming every machine uses the same simple setup for years. In August 2017, Simon Long wrote that desktop tools were being changed so they would work even when a user did not have passwordless `sudo`, rather than failing outright. (raspberrypi.com) Raspberry Pi OS remains the company’s recommended, Debian-based system, with support for more than 35,000 Debian packages and both 32-bit and 64-bit images. In that context, requiring a password for administrator access brings fresh installs closer to the defaults many Linux users already expect. (raspberrypi.com)