The operating system must be configured such that emergency administrator accounts are never automatically disabled.

From Apple OS X 10.9 (Mavericks) Workstation Security Technical Implementation Guide

Part of SRG-OS-000123

Associated with: CCI-001682

SV-72715r1_rule The operating system must be configured such that emergency administrator accounts are never automatically disabled.

Vulnerability discussion

Emergency administrator accounts are privileged accounts which are established in response to crisis situations where the need for rapid account activation is required. Therefore, emergency account activation may bypass normal account authorization processes. If these accounts are automatically disabled, system maintenance during emergencies may not be possible, thus adversely affecting system availability. Emergency administrator accounts are different from infrequently used accounts (i.e., local login accounts used by system administrators when network or normal logon/access is not available). Infrequently used accounts also remain available and are not subject to automatic termination dates. However, an emergency administrator account is normally a different account which is created for use by vendors or system maintainers.To address access requirements, many operating systems can be integrated with enterprise-level authentication/access mechanisms that meet or exceed access control policy requirements.

Check content

If an emergency account has been created on the workstation, check the expiration settings using the following command, replacing username with the correct value: sudo pwpolicy -u username get-effective-policy | tr ' ' '\n' | grep 'usingHardExpirationDate\|maxMinutesUntilDisabled If anything is returned, this is a finding.

Fix text

To remove all pwpolicy settings for the emergency account, run the following command, replacing username with the correct value: sudo dscl . -delete /Users/username PasswordPolicyOptions

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