The ESXi host must be configured to disable nonessential capabilities by disabling the ESXi shell.

Severity	Group ID	Group Title	Version	Rule ID	Date	STIG Version
medium	V-258755	SRG-OS-000095-VMM-000480	ESXI-80-000194	SV-258755r933326_rule	2023-10-11	1

Description
The ESXi Shell is an interactive command line environment available locally from the Direct Console User Interface (DCUI) or remotely via SSH. Activities performed from the ESXi Shell bypass vCenter role-based access control (RBAC) and audit controls. The ESXi shell must only be turned on when needed to troubleshoot/resolve problems that cannot be fixed through the vSphere client.

ℹ️ Check
From the vSphere Client, go to Hosts and Clusters. Select the ESXi Host >> Configure >> System >> Services. Under Services, locate the "ESXi Shell" service and verify it is "Stopped". or From a PowerCLI command prompt while connected to the ESXi host, run the following command: Get-VMHost \| Get-VMHostService \| Where {$_.Label -eq "ESXi Shell"} If the ESXi Shell service is "Running", this is a finding.

ℹ️ Check

From the vSphere Client, go to Hosts and Clusters. Select the ESXi Host >> Configure >> System >> Services. Under Services, locate the "ESXi Shell" service and verify it is "Stopped". or From a PowerCLI command prompt while connected to the ESXi host, run the following command: Get-VMHost | Get-VMHostService | Where {$_.Label -eq "ESXi Shell"} If the ESXi Shell service is "Running", this is a finding.

✔️ Fix
From the vSphere Client, go to Hosts and Clusters. Select the ESXi Host >> Configure >> System >> Services. Under "Services", select the "ESXi Shell" service and click the "Stop" button. Click the "Edit Startup policy..." button. Select the "Start and stop manually" radio button. Click "OK". or From a PowerCLI command prompt while connected to the ESXi host, run the following commands: Get-VMHost \| Get-VMHostService \| Where {$_.Label -eq "ESXi Shell"} \| Set-VMHostService -Policy Off Get-VMHost \| Get-VMHostService \| Where {$_.Label -eq "ESXi Shell"} \| Stop-VMHostService

✔️ Fix

From the vSphere Client, go to Hosts and Clusters. Select the ESXi Host >> Configure >> System >> Services. Under "Services", select the "ESXi Shell" service and click the "Stop" button. Click the "Edit Startup policy..." button. Select the "Start and stop manually" radio button. Click "OK". or From a PowerCLI command prompt while connected to the ESXi host, run the following commands: Get-VMHost | Get-VMHostService | Where {$_.Label -eq "ESXi Shell"} | Set-VMHostService -Policy Off Get-VMHost | Get-VMHostService | Where {$_.Label -eq "ESXi Shell"} | Stop-VMHostService