Why is a password-protected root account a security issue in Amazon EC2? : <p>just asking this out of curiosity. i set up a free EC2 instance last night and as i was ssh-ing around the file system, i realized the root password hadn't been set, and that there was no <code>sudo</code> password. this is shocking to me, as i'm used to always setting a root/<code>sudo</code> password during the installation or post-install setup phase of any linux distribution.</p>

<p>amazon's documentation has <a href="https://aws.amazon.com/premiumsupport/knowledge-center/set-change-root-linux/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">an article on the topic</a>, where they discourage users from setting a root password at all:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>For security purposes, it's a best practice to avoid root passwords.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>why is an unsecured root account a "best practice?" and additionally, when would i want to use a temporary root password to perform a task as the article suggests?</p>
