The DBMS itself, or the logging or alerting mechanism the application utilizes, must provide a warning when allocated audit record storage volume reaches an organization-defined percentage of maximum audit record storage capacity.

An XCCDF Rule

Description

<VulnDiscussion>It is critical for the appropriate personnel to be aware if a system is at risk of failing to process audit logs as required. Audit processing failures include: software/hardware errors, failures in the audit capturing mechanisms, and audit storage capacity being reached or exceeded. If audit log capacity were to be exceeded, then events subsequently occurring would not be recorded. Organizations shall define a maximum allowable percentage of storage capacity serving as an alarming threshold (e.g., application has exceeded 80% of log storage capacity allocated) at which time the application or the logging mechanism the application utilizes will provide a warning to the appropriate personnel. A failure of database auditing will result in either the database continuing to function without auditing or in a complete halt to database operations. When audit processing fails, appropriate personnel must be alerted immediately to avoid further downtime or unaudited transactions. This can be an alert provided by the database, a log repository, or the OS when a designated log directory is nearing capacity.</VulnDiscussion><FalsePositives></FalsePositives><FalseNegatives></FalseNegatives><Documentable>false</Documentable><Mitigations></Mitigations><SeverityOverrideGuidance></SeverityOverrideGuidance><PotentialImpacts></PotentialImpacts><ThirdPartyTools></ThirdPartyTools><MitigationControl></MitigationControl><Responsibility></Responsibility><IAControls></IAControls>

ID: SV-237717r879732_rule
Severity: Medium
References: CCI-001855
Updated: 8 months ago

Modify DBMS, OS, or third-party logging application settings to alert appropriate personnel when a specific percentage of log storage capacity is reached.

For ease of management, it is recommended that the audit tables be kept in a dedicated tablespace.

If Oracle Enterprise Manager is in use, the capability to issue such an alert is built in and configurable via the console so an email can be sent to a designated administrator.
If Enterprise Manager is unavailable, the following script can be used to monitor storage space; this can be combined with additional code to email the appropriate administrator so they can take action.

sqlplus connect as sysdba

set pagesize 300
set linesize 120
column sumb format 9,999,999,999,999
column extents format 999999
column bytes format 9,999,999,999,999
column largest format 9,999,999,999,999
column Tot_Size format 9,999,999,999,999
column Tot_Free format 9,999,999,999,999
column Pct_Free format 9,999,999,999,999
column Chunks_Free format 9,999,999,999,999
column Max_Free format 9,999,999,999,999
set echo off
spool TSINFO.txt
PROMPT  SPACE AVAILABLE IN TABLESPACES
select a.tablespace_name,sum(a.tots) Tot_Size,
sum(a.sumb) Tot_Free,
sum(a.sumb)*100/sum(a.tots) Pct_Free,   
sum(a.largest) Max_Free,sum(a.chunks) Chunks_Free
from
(
select tablespace_name,0 tots,sum(bytes) sumb,
max(bytes) largest,count(*) chunks
from dba_free_space a
group by tablespace_name
union
select tablespace_name,sum(bytes) tots,0,0,0 from
dba_data_files
group by tablespace_name) a
group by a.tablespace_name;

 Sample Output

SPACE AVAILABLE IN TABLESPACES

 TABLESPACE_NAME     TOT_SIZE     TOT_FREE     PCT_FREE     MAX_FREE     CHUNKS_FREE
 ------------------------      ------------   ------------    ------------      ------------       ------------ 
DES2                                 41,943,040   30,935,040       74                  30,935,040        1 
DES2_I                              31,457,280   23,396,352       74                 23,396,352        1 
RBS                                    60,817,408   57,085,952       94                 52,426,752       16 
SYSTEM                            94,371,840     5,386,240          6                   5,013,504        3 
TEMP                                      563,200         561,152      100                      133,120        5 
TOOLS                             120,586,240   89,407,488       74                78,190,592       12 
USERS                                   1,048,576          26,624          3                        26,624        1

The DBMS itself, or the logging or alerting mechanism the application utilizes, must provide a warning when allocated audit record storage volume reaches an organization-defined percentage of maximum audit record storage capacity.

Description

Remediation - Manual Procedure