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4.2.7 Ensure sshd ClientAliveInterval and ClientAliveCountMax are configured

Information

Note: To clarify, the two settings described below are only meant for idle connections from a protocol perspective and are not meant to check if the user is active or not. An idle user does not mean an idle connection. SSH does not and never had, intentionally, the capability to drop idle users. In SSH versions before 8.2p1 there was a bug that caused these values to behave in such a manner that they were abused to disconnect idle users. This bug has been resolved in 8.2p1 and thus it can no longer be abused disconnect idle users.

The two options ClientAliveInterval and ClientAliveCountMax control the timeout of SSH sessions. Taken directly from man 5 sshd_config:

ClientAliveInterval Sets a timeout interval in seconds after which if no data has been received from the client, sshd(8) will send a message through the encrypted channel to request a response from the client. The default is 0, indicating that these messages will not be sent to the client.

ClientAliveCountMax Sets the number of client alive messages which may be sent without sshd(8) receiving any messages back from the client. If this threshold is reached while client alive messages are being sent, sshd will disconnect the client, terminating the session. It is important to note that the use of client alive messages is very different from TCPKeepAlive. The client alive messages are sent through the encrypted channel and therefore will not be spoofable. The TCP keepalive option en-abled by TCPKeepAlive is spoofable. The client alive mechanism is valuable when the client or server depend on knowing when a connection has become unresponsive. The default value is 3. If ClientAliveInterval is set to 15, and ClientAliveCountMax is left at the default, unresponsive SSH clients will be disconnected after approximately 45 seconds. Setting a zero ClientAliveCountMax disables connection termination.

Rationale:

In order to prevent resource exhaustion, appropriate values should be set for both ClientAliveInterval and ClientAliveCountMax. Specifically, looking at the source code, ClientAliveCountMax must be greater than zero in order to utilize the ability of SSH to drop idle connections. If connections are allowed to stay open indefinitely, this can potentially be used as a DDOS attack or simple resource exhaustion could occur over unreliable networks.

The example set here is a 45 second timeout. Consult your site policy for network timeouts and apply as appropriate.

Solution

Edit the /etc/ssh/sshd_config file to set the parameters above any Include entries according to site policy.
Example:

ClientAliveInterval 15
ClientAliveCountMax 3

Note: First occurrence of a option takes precedence, Match set statements withstanding. If Include locations are enabled, used, and order of precedence is understood in your environment, the entry may be created in a file in Include location.

Default Value:

ClientAliveInterval 0

ClientAliveCountMax 3

See Also

https://workbench.cisecurity.org/benchmarks/15288

Item Details

Category: ACCESS CONTROL

References: 800-53|AC-12

Plugin: Unix

Control ID: ba87e096801d2c28128caffdda8a3ba4c0ef5427da9ef9d334fa20799ca415a0