UCF STIG Viewer Logo

RHEL 8 must automatically lock an account when three unsuccessful logon attempts occur during a 15-minute time period.


Overview

Finding ID Version Rule ID IA Controls Severity
V-230334 RHEL-08-020012 SV-230334r627750_rule Medium
Description
By limiting the number of failed logon attempts, the risk of unauthorized system access via user password guessing, otherwise known as brute-force attacks, is reduced. Limits are imposed by locking the account. RHEL 8 can utilize the "pam_faillock.so" for this purpose. Note that manual changes to the listed files may be overwritten by the "authselect" program. From "Pam_Faillock" man pages: Note that the default directory that "pam_faillock" uses is usually cleared on system boot so the access will be reenabled after system reboot. If that is undesirable a different tally directory must be set with the "dir" option. Satisfies: SRG-OS-000021-GPOS-00005, SRG-OS-000329-GPOS-00128
STIG Date
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 Security Technical Implementation Guide 2022-12-06

Details

Check Text ( C-33003r567748_chk )
Check that the system locks an account after three unsuccessful logon attempts within a period of 15 minutes with the following commands:

Note: If the System Administrator demonstrates the use of an approved centralized account management method that locks an account after three unsuccessful logon attempts within a period of 15 minutes, this requirement is not applicable.

Note: This check applies to RHEL versions 8.0 and 8.1, if the system is RHEL version 8.2 or newer, this check is not applicable.

$ sudo grep pam_faillock.so /etc/pam.d/password-auth

auth required pam_faillock.so preauth dir=/var/log/faillock silent audit deny=3 even_deny_root fail_interval=900 unlock_time=0
auth required pam_faillock.so authfail dir=/var/log/faillock unlock_time=0
account required pam_faillock.so

If the "fail_interval" option is not set to "900" or less (but not "0") on the "preauth" lines with the "pam_faillock.so" module, or is missing from this line, this is a finding.

$ sudo grep pam_faillock.so /etc/pam.d/system-auth

auth required pam_faillock.so preauth dir=/var/log/faillock silent audit deny=3 even_deny_root fail_interval=900 unlock_time=0
auth required pam_faillock.so authfail dir=/var/log/faillock unlock_time=0
account required pam_faillock.so

If the "fail_interval" option is not set to "900" or less (but not "0") on the "preauth" lines with the "pam_faillock.so" module, or is missing from this line, this is a finding.
Fix Text (F-32978r567749_fix)
Configure the operating system to lock an account when three unsuccessful logon attempts occur in 15 minutes.

Add/Modify the appropriate sections of the "/etc/pam.d/system-auth" and "/etc/pam.d/password-auth" files to match the following lines:

auth required pam_faillock.so preauth dir=/var/log/faillock silent audit deny=3 even_deny_root fail_interval=900 unlock_time=0
auth required pam_faillock.so authfail dir=/var/log/faillock unlock_time=0
account required pam_faillock.so

The "sssd" service must be restarted for the changes to take effect. To restart the "sssd" service, run the following command:

$ sudo systemctl restart sssd.service