The macOS system must enforce a minimum 15-character password length.

Overview

Finding ID	Version	Rule ID	IA Controls	Severity
V-257229	APPL-13-003010	SV-257229r905320_rule		Medium

Description
The minimum password length must be set to 15 characters. Password complexity, or strength, is a measure of the effectiveness of a password in resisting attempts at guessing and brute-force attacks. Password length is one factor of several that helps to determine strength and how long it takes to crack a password. The use of more characters in a password helps to exponentially increase the time and/or resources required to compromise the password.

Description

The minimum password length must be set to 15 characters. Password complexity, or strength, is a measure of the effectiveness of a password in resisting attempts at guessing and brute-force attacks. Password length is one factor of several that helps to determine strength and how long it takes to crack a password. The use of more characters in a password helps to exponentially increase the time and/or resources required to compromise the password.

STIG	Date
Apple macOS 13 (Ventura) Security Technical Implementation Guide	2023-08-28

Details

Check Text ( C-60914r905318_chk )
Verify the macOS system is configured to enforce a minimum 15-character password length with the following command: /usr/sbin/system_profiler SPConfigurationProfileDataType \| /usr/bin/grep "minLength" minLength = 15; If "minLength" is not set to "15", this is a finding.

Fix Text (F-60855r905319_fix)
Configure the macOS system to enforce a 15-character password length by installing the "Passcode Policy" configuration profile.