Title

RHEL 9 must ensure the password complexity module in the system-auth file is configured for three retries or less. (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. "pwquality" enforces complex password construction configuration and has the ability to limit brute-force attacks on the system. RHEL 9 uses "pwquality" as a mechanism to enforce password complexity. This is set in both: /etc/pam.d/password-auth /etc/pam.d/system-auth By limiting the number of attempts to meet the pwquality module complexity requirements before returning with an error, the system will audit abnormal attempts at password changes.

Check Content

Verify RHEL 9 is configured to limit the "pwquality" retry option to "3". Check for the use of the retry option in the security directory with the following command: $ grep -w retry /etc/security/pwquality.conf /etc/security/pwquality.conf.d/*.conf retry = 3 If the value of "retry" is set to "0" or greater than "3", or is missing, this is a finding.

Fix Text

Configure RHEL 9 to limit the "pwquality" retry option to "3". Add or update the following line in the "/etc/security/pwquality.conf" file or a file in the "/etc/security/pwquality.conf.d/" directory to contain the "retry" parameter: retry = 3

Additional Identifiers

Rule ID: SV-258091r1045185_rule

Vulnerability ID: V-258091

Group Title: SRG-OS-000069-GPOS-00037

Expert Comments

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