The Red Hat Enterprise Linux operating system must be configured so that passwords are prohibited from reuse for a minimum of five generations.

From Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Security Technical Implementation Guide

Part of SRG-OS-000077-GPOS-00045

Associated with: CCI-000200

SV-86557r3_rule The Red Hat Enterprise Linux operating system must be configured so that passwords are prohibited from reuse for a minimum of five generations.

Vulnerability discussion

Password complexity, or strength, is a measure of the effectiveness of a password in resisting attempts at guessing and brute-force attacks. If the information system or application allows the user to consecutively reuse their password when that password has exceeded its defined lifetime, the end result is a password that is not changed per policy requirements.

Check content

Verify the operating system prohibits password reuse for a minimum of five generations. Check for the value of the "remember" argument in "/etc/pam.d/system-auth" and "/etc/pam.d/password-auth" with the following command: # grep -i remember /etc/pam.d/system-auth /etc/pam.d/password-auth password requisite pam_pwhistory.so use_authtok remember=5 retry=3 If the line containing the "pam_pwhistory.so" line does not have the "remember" module argument set, is commented out, or the value of the "remember" module argument is set to less than "5", this is a finding.

Fix text

Configure the operating system to prohibit password reuse for a minimum of five generations. Add the following line in "/etc/pam.d/system-auth" and "/etc/pam.d/password-auth" (or modify the line to have the required value): password requisite pam_pwhistory.so use_authtok remember=5 retry=3 Note: Manual changes to the listed files may be overwritten by the "authconfig" program. The "authconfig" program should not be used to update the configurations listed in this requirement.

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