Verify and Correct File Permissions with RPM
An XCCDF Rule
Description
The RPM package management system can check file access permissions of installed software packages, including many that are important to system security. Verify that the file permissions of system files and commands match vendor values. Check the file permissions with the following command:
$ sudo rpm -Va | awk '{ if (substr($0,2,1)=="M") print $NF }'Output indicates files that do not match vendor defaults. After locating a file with incorrect permissions, run the following command to determine which package owns it:
$ rpm -qf FILENAME
Next, run the following command to reset its permissions to the correct values:
$ sudo rpm --setperms PACKAGENAME
warning alert: Warning
Profiles may require that specific files have stricter file permissions than defined by
the vendor. Such files will be reported as a finding and need to be evaluated according to
your policy and deployment environment.
warning alert: Warning
This rule can take a long time to perform the check and might consume a considerable
amount of resources depending on the number of packages present on the system. It is not a
problem in most cases, but especially systems with a large number of installed packages
can be affected.
See
https://access.redhat.com/articles/6999111
.Rationale
Permissions on system binaries and configuration files that are too generous could allow an unauthorized user to gain privileges that they should not have. The permissions set by the vendor should be maintained. Any deviations from this baseline should be investigated.
- ID
- xccdf_org.ssgproject.content_rule_rpm_verify_permissions
- Severity
- High
- References
- Updated
Remediation - Shell Script
# Declare array to hold set of RPM packages we need to correct permissions for
declare -A SETPERMS_RPM_DICT
# Create a list of files on the system having permissions different from what
# is expected by the RPM database
Remediation - Ansible
- name: Read list of files with incorrect permissions
command: rpm -Va --nodeps --nosignature --nofiledigest --nosize --nomtime --nordev
--nocaps --nolinkto --nouser --nogroup
register: files_with_incorrect_permissions
failed_when: files_with_incorrect_permissions.rc > 1
changed_when: false