Title

NixOS must enforce password complexity by requiring that at least one special character be used. (Cat II impact)

Discussion

Use of a complex password helps to 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 those characters that are not alphanumeric. Examples include: ~ ! @ # $ % ^ *.

Check Content

Verify NixOS enforces the use of at least one special character in passwords with the following command: $ grep minlen /etc/security/pwquality.conf ocredit=-1 If the value of "ocredit" is a positive number or is commented out, this is a finding.

Fix Text

Configure NixOS to enforce password complexity. Add/modify /etc/nixos/configuration.nix to include the following lines: environment.etc."/security/pwquality.conf".text = '' ocredit=-1 ''; Rebuild the system with the following command: $ sudo nixos-rebuild switch

Additional Identifiers

Rule ID: SV-268145r1039323_rule

Vulnerability ID: V-268145

Group Title: SRG-OS-000266-GPOS-00101

Expert Comments

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