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V-269401

CAT I (High)

AlmaLinux OS 9 must be configured so that the Pluggable Authentication Module is configured to store only encrypted representations of passwords.

Rule ID

SV-269401r1050284_rule

STIG

Cloud Linux AlmaLinux OS 9 Security Technical Implementation Guide

Version

V1R6

CCIs

CCI-004062

Discussion

Passwords must be protected at all times, and encryption is the standard method for protecting passwords. If passwords are not encrypted, they can be plainly read (i.e., clear text) and easily compromised. The system must use a strong hashing algorithm to store the password.

Check Content

Verify that the pam_unix.so module is configured to use sha512 in /etc/pam.d/password-auth with the following command:

$ grep -E "password.*pam_unix.so.*sha512" /etc/pam.d/password-auth

password    sufficient      pam_unix.so sha512 shadow rounds=100000  use_authtok

If "sha512" is missing, or the line is commented out, this is a finding.

Fix Text

Configure AlmaLinux OS 9 to use the SHA-512 algorithm for password hashing.

Edit/modify the following line in the "/etc/pam.d/password-auth" file to include the sha512 option for pam_unix.so:

password    sufficient      pam_unix.so sha512 shadow rounds=100000  use_authtok