The cp utility should only copy ACLs if `-p' is given. $ umask 022 $ mkdir d $ cd d $ touch f $ setfacl -m u:bin:rw f $ ls -l f | awk -- '{ print $1 }' > -rw-rw-r--+ $ cp f g $ ls -l g | awk -- '{sub(/\\./, "", $1); print $1 }' > -rw-r--r-- $ rm g $ cp -p f g $ ls -l f | awk -- '{ print $1 }' > -rw-rw-r--+ $ mkdir h $ echo blubb > h/x $ cp -rp h i $ cat i/x > blubb $ rm -r i Use to be "$setfacl -R -m u:bin:rwX h", but RHEL4 uncorrectly set the x flag, so we change to the following test $ setfacl -R -m u:bin:rwx h $ getfacl --omit-header h/x > user::rw- > user:bin:rwx > group::r-- > mask::rwx > other::r-- > $ cp -rp h i $ getfacl --omit-header i/x > user::rw- > user:bin:rwx > group::r-- > mask::rwx > other::r-- > $ cd .. $ rm -r d