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V-254211

CAT II (Medium)

Nutanix AOS must enforce a minimum 15 character password length.

Rule ID

SV-254211r982202_rule

STIG

Nutanix AOS 5.20.x OS Security Technical Implementation Guide

Version

V1R2

CCIs

CCI-000205

Discussion

The shorter the password, the lower the number of possible combinations that need to be tested before the password is compromised. Password complexity, or strength, is a measure of the effectiveness of a password in resisting attempts at guessing and brute-force attacks. Password length is one factor of several that helps to determine strength and how long it takes to crack a password. Use of more characters in a password helps to exponentially increase the time and/or resources required to compromise the password.

Check Content

Confirm Nutanix AOS is configured to enforce a minimum 15 character password length.

$ sudo grep minlen /etc/security/pwquality.conf
minlen = 15

If the command does not return a "minlen" value of "15" or greater, this is a finding.

Fix Text

Configure the password minimum length requirement of 15 characters by running the following command:

$ ncli cluster edit-cvm-security-params enable-high-strength-password=true