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content/blog/permission-denied-writing-privileged-locations.md

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+---
+title: "Permission Denied: Writing to Privileged Locations"
+date: 2022-04-07T20:09:40-04:00
+draft: false
+tags: []
+math: false
+---
+
+Perhaps you've tried something like the following:
+
+```bash
+sudo echo "hi" > /etc/test
+```
+
+Only to receive back an error
+
+```
+bash: /etc/test: Permission denied
+```
+
+This is because the `sudo` part only applies to the echo command. Bash which is the process that takes the `"hi"` from the `echo` standard out and writes it to `/etc/test` is still under the unprivileged user.
+
+Instead consider the following:
+
+```bash
+echo "hi" | sudo tee /etc/test
+```
+
+The command `tee` takes whatever is in standard in, and writes it to the filename specified. Since we applied `sudo ` to the `tee` command, it now has the necessary permissions to write to a privileged location.