SV-230366r1262169: RHEL 8 user account passwords must have a 180-day maximum password lifetime restriction. | Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 STIG SCAP Benchmark

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Assessment Title

Rule Text

RHEL 8 user account passwords must have a 180-day maximum password lifetime restriction.

Description

Discussion Text

Any password, no matter how complex, can eventually be cracked. Therefore, passwords need to be changed periodically. If RHEL 8 does not limit the lifetime of passwords and force users to change their passwords, there is the risk that RHEL 8 passwords could be compromised.

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

IA Controls

NIST SP 800-53

Not mappedCCI-000199Not mappedCCI-004066

References

DPMS Target Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 DISA DPMS Target Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 2921

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.stig.rhel8os:def:230366
# RHEL 8 user account passwords must have a 180-day maximum password lifetime restriction.
# Per-module read mechanism curated from static teardown of DISA's SCC tool
# (SCAP Compliance Checker) -- see the SCC Automation Reference above.

# textfilecontent54_object (textfilecontent54_test)
test_1() {
  ( [ "$(sed -En 's/^[ \t]*PASS_MAX_DAYS[ \t]+(\d+)[ \t]*$/\1/p' '/etc/login.defs')" -gt 0 ] ) && ( [ "$(sed -En 's/^[ \t]*PASS_MAX_DAYS[ \t]+(\d+)[ \t]*$/\1/p' '/etc/login.defs')" -le 180 ] )
}

if test_1; 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.stig.rhel8os:def:230366
if [ ! -f "/etc/login.defs" ]; then echo "PASS"; exit 0; fi
grep -q "^[ \t]*PASS_MAX_DAYS[ \t]+(\\d\+)[ \t]*$" /etc/login.defs || echo "PASS"; exit 0
awk '{if ($0 ~ /^[ \t]*PASS_MAX_DAYS[ \t]+(\\d+)[ \t]*$/) {split($0, a, "[ \t]*PASS_MAX_DAYS[ \t]*="); getline; split(a[2], b, "[ \t]*$"); print b; exit} }' /etc/login.defs | while read -r line; do if [ "$line" -gt 0 ] && [ "$line" -le 180 ]; then echo "PASS"; exit 0; fi; done
echo "FAIL"; exit 1

Remediation

Configure RHEL 8 to enforce a 180-day maximum password lifetime.

Add, or modify the following line in the "/etc/login.defs" file:

PASS_MAX_DAYS 180