The system must require passwords to contain at least one uppercase alphabetic character.

Overview

Finding ID	Version	Rule ID	IA Controls	Severity
RHEL-06-000057	RHEL-06-000057	RHEL-06-000057_rule		Low

Description
Requiring a minimum number of uppercase characters makes password guessing attacks more difficult by ensuring a larger search space.

STIG	Date
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 Security Technical Implementation Guide	2013-02-05

Details

Check Text ( C-RHEL-06-000057_chk )
To check how many uppercase characters are required in a password, run the following command: $ grep pam_cracklib /etc/pam.d/system-auth The "ucredit" parameter (as a negative number) will indicate how many uppercase characters are required. The DoD requires at least one uppercase character in a password. This would appear as "ucredit=-1". If ucredit is not found or not set to the required value, this is a finding.

Check Text ( C-RHEL-06-000057_chk )

To check how many uppercase characters are required in a password, run the following command:

$ grep pam_cracklib /etc/pam.d/system-auth

The "ucredit" parameter (as a negative number) will indicate how many uppercase characters are required. The DoD requires at least one uppercase character in a password. This would appear as "ucredit=-1".
If ucredit is not found or not set to the required value, this is a finding.

Fix Text (F-RHEL-06-000057_fix)
The pam_cracklib module's "ucredit=" parameter controls requirements for usage of uppercase letters in a password. When set to a negative number, any password will be required to contain that many uppercase characters. When set to a positive number, pam_cracklib will grant +1 additional length credit for each uppercase character. Add "ucredit=-1" after pam_cracklib.so to require use of an uppercase character in passwords.

Fix Text (F-RHEL-06-000057_fix)

The pam_cracklib module's "ucredit=" parameter controls requirements for usage of uppercase letters in a password. When set to a negative number, any password will be required to contain that many uppercase characters. When set to a positive number, pam_cracklib will grant +1 additional length credit for each uppercase character. Add "ucredit=-1" after pam_cracklib.so to require use of an uppercase character in passwords.