The macOS system must configure audit retention to seven days.
Overview
| Finding ID | Version | Rule ID | IA Controls | Severity |
| V-277074 | APPL-26-001029 | SV-277074r1148674_rule | CCI-001849 | low |
| Description | ||||
| The audit service must be configured to require that records be kept for an organizational-defined value before deletion unless the system uses a central audit record storage facility. When "expire-after" is set to "7d", the audit service will not delete audit logs until the log data criteria is met. | ||||
| STIG | Date | |||
| Apple macOS 26 (Tahoe) Security Technical Implementation Guide | 2026-02-11 | |||
Details
Check Text (C-277074r1148674_chk)
Verify the macOS system is configured to set audit retention to seven days with the following command:
/usr/bin/awk -F: '/expire-after/{print $2}' /etc/security/audit_control
If the result is not "7d", this is a finding.
Fix Text (F-81134r1148673_fix)
Configure the macOS system to set audit retention to seven days with the following command:
/usr/bin/sed -i.bak 's/^expire-after.*/expire-after:7d/' /etc/security/audit_control; /usr/sbin/audit -s