RHEL 9 must enforce password complexity by requiring that at least one special character be used.
Overview
| Finding ID | Version | Rule ID | IA Controls | Severity |
| V-258109 | RHEL-09-611100 | SV-258109r1045220_rule | CCI-004066 | medium |
| Description | ||||
| Use of a complex password helps to increase the time and resources required to compromise the password. Password complexity, or strength, is a measure of the effectiveness of a password in resisting attempts at guessing and brute-force attacks. Password complexity is one factor of several that determines how long it takes to crack a password. The more complex the password, the greater the number of possible combinations that need to be tested before the password is compromised. RHEL 9 utilizes "pwquality" as a mechanism to enforce password complexity. Note that to require special characters without degrading the "minlen" value, the credit value must be expressed as a negative number in "/etc/security/pwquality.conf". | ||||
| STIG | Date | |||
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 Security Technical Implementation Guide | 2025-05-14 | |||
Details
Check Text (C-258109r1045220_chk)
Verify that RHEL 9 enforces password complexity by requiring at least one special character with the following command:
$ sudo grep ocredit /etc/security/pwquality.conf /etc/security/pwquality.conf.d/*.conf
ocredit = -1
If the value of "ocredit" is a positive number or is commented out, this is a finding.
Fix Text (F-61774r1045219_fix)
Configure RHEL 9 to enforce password complexity by requiring at least one special character be used by setting the "ocredit" option.
Add or update the following line in the "/etc/security/pwquality.conf" file or a configuration file in the "/etc/security/pwquality.conf.d/" directory to contain the "ocredit" parameter:
ocredit = -1