The Photon operating system must be configured to use the pam_pwhistory.so module.

Severity	Group ID	Group Title	Version	Rule ID	Date	STIG Version
medium	V-258902	SRG-OS-000077-GPOS-00045	PHTN-40-000243	SV-258902r1003655_rule	2024-07-11	2

Description
Password complexity, or strength, is a measure of the effectiveness of a password in resisting attempts at guessing and brute-force attacks. If the information system or application allows the user to consecutively reuse their password when that password has exceeded its defined lifetime, the end result is a password that is not changed as per policy requirements.

ℹ️ Check
At the command line, run the following command to verify the pam_pwhistory.so module is used: # grep '^password' /etc/pam.d/system-password Example result: password requisite pam_pwquality.so dcredit=-1 ucredit=-1 lcredit=-1 ocredit=-1 minlen=15 difok=8 enforce_for_root dictcheck=1 password required pam_pwhistory.so remember=5 retry=3 enforce_for_root use_authtok password required pam_unix.so sha512 use_authtok shadow try_first_pass If the "pam_pwhistory.so" module is not present, this is a finding. If "use_authtok" is not present for the "pam_pwhistory.so" module, this is a finding. If "conf" or "file" are present for the "pam_pwhistory.so" module, this is a finding.

ℹ️ Check

At the command line, run the following command to verify the pam_pwhistory.so module is used: # grep '^password' /etc/pam.d/system-password Example result: password requisite pam_pwquality.so dcredit=-1 ucredit=-1 lcredit=-1 ocredit=-1 minlen=15 difok=8 enforce_for_root dictcheck=1 password required pam_pwhistory.so remember=5 retry=3 enforce_for_root use_authtok password required pam_unix.so sha512 use_authtok shadow try_first_pass If the "pam_pwhistory.so" module is not present, this is a finding. If "use_authtok" is not present for the "pam_pwhistory.so" module, this is a finding. If "conf" or "file" are present for the "pam_pwhistory.so" module, this is a finding.

✔️ Fix
Navigate to and open: /etc/pam.d/system-password Add or update the pam_pwhistory.so module line as follows: password required pam_pwhistory.so remember=5 retry=3 enforce_for_root use_authtok Note: The line must be configured after pam_pwquality.so. Note: On vCenter appliances, the equivalent file must be edited under "/etc/applmgmt/appliance", if one exists, for the changes to persist after a reboot.

✔️ Fix

Navigate to and open: /etc/pam.d/system-password Add or update the pam_pwhistory.so module line as follows: password required pam_pwhistory.so remember=5 retry=3 enforce_for_root use_authtok Note: The line must be configured after pam_pwquality.so. Note: On vCenter appliances, the equivalent file must be edited under "/etc/applmgmt/appliance", if one exists, for the changes to persist after a reboot.