The PAM system service can be configured to only store encrypted
representations of passwords. In "/etc/pam.d/system-auth", the
password section of the file controls which PAM modules execute
during a password change. Set the pam_unix.so module in the
password section to include the argument sha512, as shown
below:
password sufficient pam_unix.so sha512 other arguments...
This will help ensure when local users change their passwords, hashes for
the new passwords will be generated using the SHA-512 algorithm. This is
the default.