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The Photon operating system must configure Secure Shell (SSH) to disallow authentication with an empty password.

An XCCDF Rule

Description

Blank passwords are one of the first things an attacker checks for when probing a system. Even if the user somehow has a blank password on the OS, SSH must not allow that user to log in.

ID
SV-258870r933671_rule
Version
PHTN-40-000207
Severity
High
References
Updated

Remediation Templates

A Manual Procedure

Navigate to and open:

/etc/ssh/sshd_config

Ensure the "PermitEmptyPasswords" line is uncommented and set to the following: