Guide to the Secure Configuration of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7
Rules, Groups, and Values defined within the XCCDF Benchmark
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Disable X11 Forwarding
The X11Forwarding parameter provides the ability to tunnel X11 traffic through the connection to enable remote graphic connections. SSH has the capability to encrypt remote X11 connections when SSH...Rule Medium Severity -
Do Not Allow SSH Environment Options
Ensure that users are not able to override environment variables of the SSH daemon. <br> The default SSH configuration disables environment processing. The appropriate configuration is used if no v...Rule Medium Severity -
Enable GSSAPI Authentication
Sites setup to use Kerberos or other GSSAPI Authenticaion require setting sshd to accept this authentication. To enable GSSAPI authentication, add or correct the following line in <code>/etc/ssh/...Rule Medium Severity -
Enable PAM
UsePAM Enables the Pluggable Authentication Module interface. If set to “yes” this will enable PAM authentication using ChallengeResponseAuthentication and PasswordAuthentication in addition to PAM...Rule Medium Severity -
Enable Public Key Authentication
Enable SSH login with public keys. <br> The default SSH configuration enables authentication based on public keys. The appropriate configuration is used if no value is set for <code>PubkeyAuthentic...Rule Medium Severity -
Enable Use of Strict Mode Checking
SSHs <code>StrictModes</code> option checks file and ownership permissions in the user's home directory <code>.ssh</code> folder before accepting login. If world- writable permissions are found, lo...Rule Medium Severity -
Enable SSH Warning Banner
To enable the warning banner and ensure it is consistent across the system, add or correct the following line in <code>/etc/ssh/sshd_config</code>: <pre>Banner /etc/issue</pre> Another section c...Rule Medium Severity -
Enable SSH Warning Banner
To enable the warning banner and ensure it is consistent across the system, add or correct the following line in <code>/etc/ssh/sshd_config</code>: <pre>Banner /etc/issue.net</pre> Another sectio...Rule Medium Severity -
Enable Encrypted X11 Forwarding
By default, remote X11 connections are not encrypted when initiated by users. SSH has the capability to encrypt remote X11 connections when SSH's <code>X11Forwarding</code> option is enabled. <br><...Rule High Severity -
Limit Users' SSH Access
By default, the SSH configuration allows any user with an account to access the system. There are several options available to limit which users and group can access the system via SSH. It is recom...Rule Unknown Severity -
Enable SSH Print Last Log
Ensure that SSH will display the date and time of the last successful account logon. <br> The default SSH configuration enables print of the date and time of the last login. The appropriate configu...Rule Medium Severity -
Force frequent session key renegotiation
The <code>RekeyLimit</code> parameter specifies how often the session key of the is renegotiated, both in terms of amount of data that may be transmitted and the time elapsed.<br> To decrease the d...Rule Medium Severity -
Ensure SSH LoginGraceTime is configured
The <code>LoginGraceTime</code> parameter to the SSH server specifies the time allowed for successful authentication to the SSH server. The longer the Grace period is the more open unauthenticated ...Rule Medium Severity -
Set LogLevel to INFO
The INFO parameter specifices that record login and logout activity will be logged. <br> The default SSH configuration sets the log level to INFO. The appropriate configuration is used if no value ...Rule Low Severity -
Set SSH Daemon LogLevel to VERBOSE
The <code>VERBOSE</code> parameter configures the SSH daemon to record login and logout activity. To specify the log level in SSH, add or correct the following line in <code>/etc/ssh/sshd_config<...Rule Medium Severity -
Set SSH authentication attempt limit
The <code>MaxAuthTries</code> parameter specifies the maximum number of authentication attempts permitted per connection. Once the number of failures reaches half this value, additional failures ar...Rule Medium Severity -
Set SSH MaxSessions limit
The <code>MaxSessions</code> parameter specifies the maximum number of open sessions permitted from a given connection. To set MaxSessions edit <code>/etc/ssh/sshd_config</code> as follows: <pre>Ma...Rule Medium Severity -
Ensure SSH MaxStartups is configured
The MaxStartups parameter specifies the maximum number of concurrent unauthenticated connections to the SSH daemon. Additional connections will be dropped until authentication succeeds or the Login...Rule Medium Severity -
Use Only FIPS 140-2 Validated Ciphers
Limit the ciphers to those algorithms which are FIPS-approved. Counter (CTR) mode is also preferred over cipher-block chaining (CBC) mode. The following line in <code>/etc/ssh/sshd_config</code> de...Rule Medium Severity -
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