The operating system must enforce a minimum 15-character password length.

Severity	Group ID	Group Title	Version	Rule ID	Date	STIG Version
medium	V-203634	SRG-OS-000078	SRG-OS-000078-GPOS-00046	SV-203634r982202_rule	2024-12-04	3

Description
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.

Description

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.

ℹ️ Check
Verify the operating system enforces a minimum 15-character password length. If it does not, this is a finding.

✔️ Fix
Configure the operating system to enforce a minimum 15-character password length.