Title

Only administrators responsible for the system must have Administrator rights on the system. (Cat I impact)

Discussion

An account that does not have Administrator duties must not have Administrator rights. Such rights would allow the account to bypass or modify required security restrictions on that machine and make it vulnerable to attack. System administrators must log on to systems only using accounts with the minimum level of authority necessary. For domain joined workstations, the Domain Admins group must be replaced by a domain workstation administrator group. Restricting highly privileged accounts from the local Administrators group helps mitigate the risk of privilege escalation resulting from credential theft attacks. Standard user accounts must not be members of the built-in Administrators group.

Check Content

Review the local Administrators group. Only the appropriate administrator groups or accounts responsible for administration of the system may be members of the group. For domain joined workstations, the Domain Admins group must be replaced by a domain workstation administrator group. Standard user accounts must not be members of the local administrator group. If prohibited accounts are members of the local administrators group, this is a finding. The built-in Administrator account or other required administrative accounts would not be a finding.

Fix Text

Configure the system to include only administrator groups or accounts that are responsible for the system in the local Administrators group. For domain joined workstations, replace the Domain Admins group with a domain workstation administrator group. Remove any standard user accounts.

Additional Identifiers

Rule ID: SV-29504r2_rule

Vulnerability ID: V-1127

Group Title: Restricted Administrator Group Membership

Expert Comments

CCIs tied to check.

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