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1.273 RHEL-10-600485

Information

RHEL 10 must ensure the password complexity module in the system-auth file is configured for three or fewer retries.

GROUP ID: V-281204
RULE ID: SV-281204r1197240

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 10 uses "pwquality" as a mechanism to enforce password complexity. This is set in both of the following:

"/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.

Solution

Configure RHEL 10 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

See Also

https://workbench.cisecurity.org/benchmarks/26403

Item Details

Category: IDENTIFICATION AND AUTHENTICATION

References: 800-53|IA-5(1), CAT|II, CCI|CCI-004066, Rule-ID|SV-281204r1197240_rule, STIG-ID|RHEL-10-600485, Vuln-ID|V-281204

Plugin: Unix

Control ID: b9ec948c32d51719532f07780ee1646bcb2053f1a1e2b69691047b53ba9d4838