As I mentioned in my last comment, yesterday I logged into my computer after it had been up for 3 days at the login screen. Upon logging in, polkitd was using nearly 1 GB of memory: $ uptime 09:09:38 up 3 days, 15:57, 1 user, load average: 0.06, 0.05, 0.05 $ ps aux | grep polkitd | grep -v grep root 1034 0.4 11.2 1137788 912732 ? Sl Jul02 23:23 /usr/lib/policykit-1/polkitd --no-debug $ date Mon Jul 6 09:11:17 EDT 2015 After nearly 8 hours of being logged in, polkitd memory usage had barely gone up: $ date; uptime; ps aux | grep polkitd | grep -v grep Mon Jul 6 17:04:42 EDT 2015 17:04:42 up 3 days, 23:52, 4 users, load average: 0.36, 0.25, 0.26 root 1034 0.4 11.2 1148092 913328 ? Sl Jul02 23:24 /usr/lib/policykit-1/polkitd --no-debug Then I added some commands to /etc/rc.local to log polkitd memory usage as well as output from dbus-monitor --system, rebooted my machine, and left it at the login prompt. I checked it this morning, after about 16 hours of being left at the login prompt. The output log from dbus-monitor --system was over 100 MB and nearly entirely full of messages like this, with new messages being constantly added: signal sender=org.freedesktop.DBus -> dest=(null destination) serial=44 path=/org/freedesktop/DBus; interface=org.freedesktop.DBus; member=NameOwnerChanged string ":1.252082" string ":1.252082" string "" signal sender=org.freedesktop.DBus -> dest=(null destination) serial=45 path=/org/freedesktop/DBus; interface=org.freedesktop.DBus; member=NameOwnerChanged string ":1.252083" string "" string ":1.252083" signal sender=org.freedesktop.DBus -> dest=(null destination) serial=46 path=/org/freedesktop/DBus; interface=org.freedesktop.DBus; member=NameOwnerChanged string ":1.252083" string ":1.252083" string "" signal sender=org.freedesktop.DBus -> dest=(null destination) serial=47 path=/org/freedesktop/DBus; interface=org.freedesktop.DBus; member=NameOwnerChanged string ":1.252084" string "" string ":1.252084" signal sender=org.freedesktop.DBus -> dest=(null destination) serial=48 path=/org/freedesktop/DBus; interface=org.freedesktop.DBus; member=NameOwnerChanged string ":1.252084" string ":1.252084" string "" The polkitd memory usage seems to have increased about 10 MB every hour: Mon Jul 6 17:07:37 EDT 2015 17:07:37 up 0 min, 0 users, load average: 2.65, 0.71, 0.24 root 1234 0.0 0.0 279764 7748 ? Sl 17:07 0:00 /usr/lib/policykit-1/polkitd --no-debug Mon Jul 6 18:07:38 EDT 2015 18:07:38 up 1:00, 0 users, load average: 0.02, 0.02, 0.05 root 1234 0.4 0.2 287188 18908 ? Sl 17:07 0:16 /usr/lib/policykit-1/polkitd --no-debug Mon Jul 6 19:07:38 EDT 2015 19:07:38 up 2:00, 0 users, load average: 0.03, 0.05, 0.05 root 1234 0.4 0.3 293920 29112 ? Sl 17:07 0:34 /usr/lib/policykit-1/polkitd --no-debug Mon Jul 6 20:07:38 EDT 2015 20:07:38 up 3:00, 0 users, load average: 0.08, 0.03, 0.05 root 1234 0.4 0.4 300784 39328 ? Sl 17:07 0:51 /usr/lib/policykit-1/polkitd --no-debug Mon Jul 6 21:07:38 EDT 2015 21:07:38 up 4:00, 0 users, load average: 0.00, 0.01, 0.05 root 1234 0.4 0.6 307516 49816 ? Sl 17:07 1:09 /usr/lib/policykit-1/polkitd --no-debug Mon Jul 6 22:07:38 EDT 2015 22:07:38 up 5:00, 0 users, load average: 0.00, 0.01, 0.05 root 1234 0.4 0.7 314380 60040 ? Sl 17:07 1:26 /usr/lib/policykit-1/polkitd --no-debug Mon Jul 6 23:07:38 EDT 2015 23:07:38 up 6:00, 0 users, load average: 0.00, 0.01, 0.05 root 1234 0.4 0.8 321112 70520 ? Sl 17:07 1:44 /usr/lib/policykit-1/polkitd --no-debug Tue Jul 7 00:07:38 EDT 2015 00:07:38 up 7:00, 0 users, load average: 0.00, 0.02, 0.05 root 1234 0.4 0.9 327976 80756 ? Sl Jul06 2:01 /usr/lib/policykit-1/polkitd --no-debug Tue Jul 7 01:07:38 EDT 2015 01:07:38 up 8:00, 0 users, load average: 0.00, 0.03, 0.05 root 1234 0.4 1.1 334708 91244 ? Sl Jul06 2:19 /usr/lib/policykit-1/polkitd --no-debug Tue Jul 7 02:07:38 EDT 2015 02:07:38 up 9:00, 0 users, load average: 0.03, 0.04, 0.05 root 1234 0.4 1.2 341440 101472 ? Sl Jul06 2:36 /usr/lib/policykit-1/polkitd --no-debug Tue Jul 7 03:07:38 EDT 2015 03:07:38 up 10:00, 0 users, load average: 0.02, 0.05, 0.05 root 1234 0.4 1.3 348304 111700 ? Sl Jul06 2:54 /usr/lib/policykit-1/polkitd --no-debug Tue Jul 7 04:07:38 EDT 2015 04:07:38 up 11:00, 0 users, load average: 0.16, 0.06, 0.06 root 1234 0.4 1.5 355036 122176 ? Sl Jul06 3:11 /usr/lib/policykit-1/polkitd --no-debug Tue Jul 7 05:07:38 EDT 2015 05:07:38 up 12:00, 0 users, load average: 0.00, 0.01, 0.05 root 1234 0.4 1.6 361900 132400 ? Sl Jul06 3:29 /usr/lib/policykit-1/polkitd --no-debug Tue Jul 7 06:07:38 EDT 2015 06:07:38 up 13:00, 0 users, load average: 0.00, 0.01, 0.05 root 1234 0.4 1.7 368632 142876 ? Sl Jul06 3:46 /usr/lib/policykit-1/polkitd --no-debug Tue Jul 7 07:07:38 EDT 2015 07:07:38 up 14:00, 0 users, load average: 0.00, 0.01, 0.05 root 1234 0.4 1.8 375496 153096 ? Sl Jul06 4:03 /usr/lib/policykit-1/polkitd --no-debug Tue Jul 7 08:07:38 EDT 2015 08:07:38 up 15:00, 0 users, load average: 0.02, 0.26, 0.20 root 1234 0.4 2.0 382228 163312 ? Sl Jul06 4:21 /usr/lib/policykit-1/polkitd --no-debug Tue Jul 7 09:07:38 EDT 2015 09:07:38 up 16:00, 2 users, load average: 1.88, 1.94, 0.87 root 1234 0.4 2.1 398868 173812 ? Sl Jul06 4:37 /usr/lib/policykit-1/polkitd --no-debug I'm not sure what those dbus messages mean, so that's the next thing I'll look into.