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1.1.5 NTP authentication

Information

NTP authentication verifies that time updates come from a trusted server, preventing bad actors from spoofing time or altering your clock.

The NTP authentication model is the opposite of the typical client-server authentication model. NTP authentication enables an NTP client or peer to authenticate time received from their servers and peers. It's not used to authenticate NTP clients because NTP servers don't care about the authenticity of their clients as they never accept any time from them.

Authentication support allows the NTP client to verify that servers are in fact known and trusted and not intruders intending accidentally or intentionally to masquerade as a legitimate server.

Solution

switch(config)#ntp authentication-key 1 sha1 timesync
switch(config)#ntp trusted-key 1

Impact:

NTP authentication requires server side configuration with a matching key. Mismatches will prevent successful synchronization.

See Also

https://workbench.cisecurity.org/benchmarks/25683

Item Details

Category: AUDIT AND ACCOUNTABILITY

References: 800-53|AU-8

Plugin: Arista

Control ID: 819e7532c8bcb4062a3ed77cb97c5e741ff0331c648c066a445adbf9b3ac4a54