SV-38680r1: The system must restrict the ability to switch to the root user to members of a defined group. | AIX 6.1 SECURITY TECHNICAL IMPLEMENTATION GUIDE

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Assessment Title

Rule Text

The system must restrict the ability to switch to the root user to members of a defined group.

Description

Discussion Text

Configuring a supplemental group for users permitted to switch to the root user prevents unauthorized users from accessing the root account, even with knowledge of the root credentials.

How this relates to the STIG checklist: STIG vs SCAP benchmark.

IA Controls

NIST SP 800-53

Not mappedCCI-000009

Additional Details

Responsibility

System Administrator

IA Controls

ECLP-1

References

DPMS Target AIX 6.1 DISA DPMS Target AIX 6.1 2176

SCC Automation Reference

The reconstructed evaluation script behind this rule's OVAL check(s) — every module a compound check combines, with this rule's own concrete values and DISA's SCC tool's real per-module mechanism curated from static teardown of SCC releases.

#!/bin/bash
# Reconstructed from oval:mil.disa.fso.aix11:def:52
# The system must restrict the ability to switch to the root user to members of a defined group.
# Per-module read mechanism curated from static teardown of DISA's SCC tool
# (SCAP Compliance Checker) -- see the SCC Automation Reference above.

# root has sugroups specified
# textfilecontent54_object (textfilecontent54_test)
test_1() {
  grep -Pq '^root:
([^:
]+=[^
]*
)*[ 	]*(sugroups =[^
]*
)' '/etc/security/user' &>/dev/null
}
# root sugroups not ALL
# textfilecontent54_object (textfilecontent54_test)
test_2() {
  (sed -En 's/^root:
([^:
]+=[^
]*
)*[ 	]*(sugroups =[^
]*
)/\1/p' '/etc/security/user') | grep -Pq '^sugroups = .*ALL.*'
}

if ( test_1 && test_2 ); then
  echo "PASS"
else
  echo "FAIL"
fi

Assessment Script Powered by AISandbox-executed

A standalone Shell script to assess this control automatically. Review before running it in your environment.

Syntax-checked and actually executed in an isolated sandbox (not the real system this checks) — confirmed to run without errors.

#!/bin/sh
# OVAL Definition: oval:mil.disa.fso.aix11:def:52

if [ ! -f "/etc/security/user" ]; then echo "PASS"; exit 0; fi
grep -q "^root:\n.*\busugroups = adm\n" /etc/security/user || echo "FAIL"; exit 1
if grep -q "^sugroups =.*ALL.*" /etc/security/user; then echo "FAIL"; exit 1; fi
echo "PASS"; exit 0

Remediation

Use the chsec command to only allow users in the adm group to su to root.
#chsec -f /etc/security/user -s root -a sugroups=adm