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V-269153

CAT II (Medium)

AlmaLinux OS 9 must maintain an account lock until the locked account is manually released by an administrator; and not automatically after a set time.

Rule ID

SV-269153r1050035_rule

STIG

Cloud Linux AlmaLinux OS 9 Security Technical Implementation Guide

Version

V1R6

CCIs

CCI-002238

Discussion

By limiting the number of failed logon attempts, the risk of unauthorized system access via user password guessing, otherwise known as brute-force attacks, is reduced. Limits are imposed by locking the account.

Check Content

Verify AlmaLinux OS 9 is configured to lock an account until released by an administrator after three unsuccessful logon attempts with the command:

$ grep unlock_time /etc/security/faillock.conf

unlock_time = 0

If the "unlock_time" option is not set to "0", the line is missing, or is commented out, this is a finding.

Fix Text

Configure AlmaLinux OS 9 to lock accounts until released by an administrator using pam_faillock.

First, enable the feature using the following command:

$ authselect enable-feature with-faillock

Then, add or uncomment the following line in the "/etc/security/faillock.conf" file:

unlock_time = 0