Title

RHEL 9 must be configured to use TCP syncookies. (Cat II impact)

Discussion

Preventing unauthorized information transfers mitigates the risk of information, including encrypted representations of information, produced by the actions of prior users/roles (or the actions of processes acting on behalf of prior users/roles) from being available to any current users/roles (or current processes) that obtain access to shared system resources (e.g., registers, main memory, hard disks) after those resources have been released back to information systems. The control of information in shared resources is also commonly referred to as object reuse and residual information protection. This requirement generally applies to the design of an information technology product, but it can also apply to the configuration of particular information system components that are, or use, such products. This can be verified by acceptance/validation processes in DOD or other government agencies. There may be shared resources with configurable protections (e.g., files in storage) that may be assessed on specific information system components. Restricting access to the kernel message buffer limits access to only root. This prevents attackers from gaining additional system information as a nonprivileged user. The sysctl --system command will load settings from all system configuration files. All configuration files are sorted by their filename in lexicographic order, regardless of the directories in which they reside. If multiple files specify the same option, the entry in the file with the lexicographically latest name will take precedence. Files are read from directories in the following list from top to bottom. Once a file of a given filename is loaded, any file of the same name in subsequent directories is ignored. /etc/sysctl.d/*.conf /run/sysctl.d/*.conf /usr/local/lib/sysctl.d/*.conf /usr/lib/sysctl.d/*.conf /lib/sysctl.d/*.conf /etc/sysctl.conf Satisfies: SRG-OS-000480-GPOS-00227, SRG-OS-000420-GPOS-00186, SRG-OS-000142-GPOS-00071

Check Content

Verify RHEL 9 is configured to use IPv4 TCP syncookies. Determine if syncookies are used with the following command: Check the status of TCP syncookies. $ sudo sysctl net.ipv4.tcp_syncookies net.ipv4.tcp_syncookies = 1 Check that the configuration files are present to enable this kernel parameter. $ sudo grep -r kernel.dmesg_restrict /run/sysctl.d/*.conf /usr/local/lib/sysctl.d/*.conf /usr/lib/sysctl.d/*.conf /lib/sysctl.d/*.conf /etc/sysctl.conf /etc/sysctl.d/*.conf /etc/sysctl.d/99-sysctl.conf:net.ipv4.tcp_syncookies = 1 If "net.ipv4.tcp_syncookies" is not set to "1", is missing, or commented out, this is a finding. If conflicting results are returned, this is a finding.

Fix Text

Configure RHEL 9 to use TCP syncookies. Add or edit the following line in a system configuration file in the "/etc/sysctl.d/" directory: net.ipv4.tcp_syncookies = 1 Remove any configurations that conflict with the above from the following locations: /run/sysctl.d/*.conf /usr/local/lib/sysctl.d/*.conf /usr/lib/sysctl.d/*.conf /lib/sysctl.d/*.conf /etc/sysctl.conf /etc/sysctl.d/*.conf Load settings from all system configuration files with the following command: $ sudo sysctl --system

Additional Identifiers

Rule ID: SV-257957r1106317_rule

Vulnerability ID: V-257957

Group Title: SRG-OS-000480-GPOS-00227

Expert Comments

CCIs tied to check.

Controls tied to check. These are derived from the CCIs shown above.