The ESXi host Secure Shell (SSH) daemon must disable port forwarding.

Severity
Group ID
Group Title
Version
Rule ID
Date
STIG Version
mediumV-256434SRG-OS-000480-VMM-002000ESXI-70-000082SV-256434r959010_rule2025-02-111
Description
While enabling Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) tunnels is a valuable function of sshd, this feature is not appropriate for use on the ESXi hypervisor.
ℹ️ Check
From an ESXi shell, run the following command: # /usr/lib/vmware/openssh/bin/sshd -T|grep allowtcpforwarding Expected result: allowtcpforwarding no If the output does not match the expected result, this is a finding.
✔️ Fix
From an ESXi shell, add or correct the following line in "/etc/ssh/sshd_config": AllowTcpForwarding no