The SUSE operating system must enforce passwords that contain at least one special character.

Overview

Finding ID	Version	Rule ID	IA Controls	Severity
V-217120	SLES-12-010180	SV-217120r603262_rule		Medium

Description
Use of a complex password helps increase the time and resources required to compromise the password. Password complexity or strength is a measure of the effectiveness of a password in resisting attempts at guessing and brute-force attacks. Password complexity is one factor in determining how long it takes to crack a password. The more complex the password, the greater the number of possible combinations that need to be tested before the password is compromised. Special characters are not alphanumeric. Examples include: ~ ! @ # $ % ^ *.

Description

Use of a complex password helps increase the time and resources required to compromise the password. Password complexity or strength is a measure of the effectiveness of a password in resisting attempts at guessing and brute-force attacks. Password complexity is one factor in determining how long it takes to crack a password. The more complex the password, the greater the number of possible combinations that need to be tested before the password is compromised. Special characters are not alphanumeric. Examples include: ~ ! @ # $ % ^ *.

STIG	Date
SLES 12 Security Technical Implementation Guide	2023-03-06

Details

Check Text ( C-18348r369516_chk )
Verify the SUSE operating system enforces password complexity by requiring that at least one special character. Check that the operating system enforces password complexity by requiring that at least one special character be used by using the following command: # grep pam_cracklib.so /etc/pam.d/common-password password requisite pam_cracklib.so ocredit=-1 If the command does not return anything, the returned line is commented out, or has a second column value different from "requisite", or does not contain "ocredit=-1", this is a finding.

Check Text ( C-18348r369516_chk )

Verify the SUSE operating system enforces password complexity by requiring that at least one special character.

Check that the operating system enforces password complexity by requiring that at least one special character be used by using the following command:

# grep pam_cracklib.so /etc/pam.d/common-password
password requisite pam_cracklib.so ocredit=-1

If the command does not return anything, the returned line is commented out, or has a second column value different from "requisite", or does not contain "ocredit=-1", this is a finding.

Fix Text (F-18346r369517_fix)
Configure the SUSE operating system to enforce password complexity by requiring at least one special character. Edit "/etc/pam.d/common-password" and edit the line containing "pam_cracklib.so" to contain the option "ocredit=-1" after the third column.