VMware vSphere 8.0 Virtual Machine Security Technical Implementation Guide

Overview

Version	Date	Finding Count (25)			Downloads
2	2024-07-11 2023-10-11 2023-10-11 2023-10-11 2023-10-11	CAT I (High): 0	CAT II (Med): 17	CAT III (Low): 8	Excel	JSON	XML

STIG Description
This Security Technical Implementation Guide is published as a tool to improve the security of Department of Defense (DOD) information systems. The requirements are derived from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) 800-53 and related documents. Comments or proposed revisions to this document should be sent via email to the following address: disa.stig_spt@mail.mil.

Available Profiles

Classified	Public	Sensitive
I - Mission Critical Classified	I - Mission Critical Public	I - Mission Critical Sensitive	II - Mission Support Classified	II - Mission Support Public	II - Mission Support Sensitive	III - Administrative Classified	III - Administrative Public	III - Administrative Sensitive

Findings (MAC III - Administrative Public)

Finding ID	Severity	Title	Description
V-258725	Medium	Virtual machines (VMs) must remove unneeded serial devices.	Ensure no device is connected to a virtual machine if it is not required. For example, floppy, serial, and parallel ports are rarely used for virtual machines in a data center environment, and...
V-258724	Medium	Virtual machines (VMs) must remove unneeded parallel devices.	Ensure no device is connected to a virtual machine if it is not required. For example, floppy, serial, and parallel ports are rarely used for virtual machines in a data center environment, and...
V-258727	Medium	Virtual machines (VMs) must disable DirectPath I/O devices when not required.	VMDirectPath I/O (PCI passthrough) enables direct assignment of hardware PCI functions to VMs. This gives the VM access to the PCI functions with minimal intervention from the ESXi host. This is a...
V-258726	Medium	Virtual machines (VMs) must remove unneeded USB devices.	Ensure no device is connected to a virtual machine if it is not required. For example, floppy, serial, and parallel ports are rarely used for virtual machines in a data center environment, and...
V-258721	Medium	Virtual machines (VMs) must not use independent, nonpersistent disks.	The security issue with nonpersistent disk mode is that successful attackers, with a simple shutdown or reboot, might undo or remove any traces they were ever on the machine. To safeguard against...
V-258720	Medium	Virtual machines (VMs) must enable logging.	The ESXi hypervisor maintains logs for each individual VM by default. These logs contain information including, but not limited to, power events, system failure information, tools status and...
V-258722	Medium	Virtual machines (VMs) must remove unneeded floppy devices.	Ensure no device is connected to a virtual machine if it is not required. For example, floppy, serial, and parallel ports are rarely used for virtual machines in a data center environment, and...
V-258707	Medium	Virtual machines (VMs) must have virtual disk wiping disabled.	Shrinking and wiping (erasing) a virtual disk reclaims unused space in it. If there is empty space in the disk, this process reduces the amount of space the virtual disk occupies on the host...
V-258706	Medium	Virtual machines (VMs) must have virtual disk shrinking disabled.	Shrinking a virtual disk reclaims unused space in it. If there is empty space in the disk, this process reduces the amount of space the virtual disk occupies on the host drive. Normal users and...
V-258708	Medium	Virtual machines (VMs) must limit console sharing.	By default, more than one user at a time can connect to remote console sessions. When multiple sessions are activated, each terminal window receives a notification about the new session. If an...
V-258714	Medium	Virtual machines (VMs) must be configured to lock when the last console connection is closed.	When accessing the VM console, the guest operating system must be locked when the last console user disconnects, limiting the possibility of session hijacking. This setting only applies to...
V-258716	Medium	Virtual machines (VMs) must enable encryption for vMotion.	vMotion migrations in vSphere 6.0 and earlier transferred working memory and CPU state information in clear text over the vMotion network. As of vSphere 6.5, this transfer can be transparently...
V-258717	Medium	Virtual machines (VMs) must enable encryption for Fault Tolerance.	Fault Tolerance log traffic can be encrypted. This could contain sensitive data from the protected machine's memory or CPU instructions. vSphere Fault Tolerance performs frequent checks between a...
V-258710	Medium	Virtual machines (VMs) must prevent unauthorized removal, connection, and modification of devices.	In a virtual machine, users and processes without root or administrator privileges can connect or disconnect devices, such as network adaptors and CD-ROM drives, and can modify device settings....
V-258711	Medium	Virtual machines (VMs) must not be able to obtain host information from the hypervisor.	If enabled, a VM can obtain detailed information about the physical host. The default value for the parameter is FALSE. This setting should not be TRUE unless a particular VM requires this...
V-258718	Medium	Virtual machines (VMs) must configure log size.	The ESXi hypervisor maintains logs for each individual VM by default. These logs contain information including but not limited to power events, system failure information, tools status and...
V-258719	Medium	Virtual machines (VMs) must configure log retention.	The ESXi hypervisor maintains logs for each individual VM by default. These logs contain information including but not limited to power events, system failure information, tools status and...
V-258723	Low	Virtual machines (VMs) must remove unneeded CD/DVD devices.	Ensure no device is connected to a virtual machine if it is not required. For example, floppy, serial, and parallel ports are rarely used for virtual machines in a data center environment, and...
V-258705	Low	Virtual machines (VMs) must have paste operations disabled.	Copy and paste operations are disabled by default; however, explicitly disabling this feature will enable audit controls to verify this setting is correct. Copy, paste, drag and drop, or GUI...
V-258704	Low	Virtual machines (VMs) must have drag and drop operations disabled.	Copy and paste operations are disabled by default; however, explicitly disabling this feature will enable audit controls to verify this setting is correct. Copy, paste, drag and drop, or GUI...
V-258703	Low	Virtual machines (VMs) must have copy operations disabled.	Copy and paste operations are disabled by default; however, explicitly disabling this feature will enable audit controls to verify this setting is correct. Copy, paste, drag and drop, or GUI...
V-258709	Low	Virtual machines (VMs) must limit informational messages from the virtual machine to the VMX file.	The configuration file containing these name-value pairs is limited to a size of 1MB. If not limited, VMware tools in the guest operating system are capable of sending a large and continuous data...
V-258715	Low	Virtual machines (VMs) must disable 3D features when not required.	For performance reasons, it is recommended that 3D acceleration be disabled on virtual machines that do not require 3D functionality (e.g., most server workloads or desktops not using 3D applications).
V-258712	Low	Virtual machines (VMs) must have shared salt values disabled.	When salting is enabled (Mem.ShareForceSalting=1 or 2) to share a page between two virtual machines, both salt and the content of the page must be same. A salt value is a configurable advanced...
V-258713	Low	Virtual machines (VMs) must disable access through the "dvfilter" network Application Programming Interface (API).	An attacker might compromise a VM by using the "dvFilter" API. Configure only VMs that need this access to use the API.