SV-257818r1044876: The kdump service on RHEL 9 must be disabled. | Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 STIG SCAP Benchmark

Loading benchmark…

Assessment Title

Rule Text

The kdump service on RHEL 9 must be disabled.

Description

Discussion Text

Kernel core dumps may contain the full contents of system memory at the time of the crash. Kernel core dumps consume a considerable amount of disk space and may result in denial of service by exhausting the available space on the target file system partition. Unless the system is used for kernel development or testing, there is little need to run the kdump service.

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

IA Controls

NIST SP 800-53

Not mappedCCI-000366

References

DPMS Target Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 DISA DPMS Target Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 5551

Checks

DISA STIG (Manual Reference)

Verify that the kdump service is disabled in system boot configuration with the following command:

$ sudo systemctl is-enabled  kdump  

disabled 

Verify that the kdump service is not active (i.e., not running) through current runtime configuration with the following command:

$ sudo systemctl is-active kdump 

masked 

Verify that the kdump service is masked with the following command:

$ sudo systemctl show  kdump  | grep "LoadState\|UnitFileState" 

LoadState=masked 
UnitFileState=masked 

If the "kdump" service is loaded or active, and is not masked, this is a finding.

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.rhel9os:def:257818
# The kdump service on RHEL 9 must be disabled.
# Per-module read mechanism curated from static teardown of DISA's SCC tool
# (SCAP Compliance Checker) -- see the SCC Automation Reference above.

# systemdunitproperty_object (systemdunitproperty_test)
test_1() {
  (systemctl show -p 'LoadState' --value 'kdump.service') | grep -qxF 'masked'
}
# systemdunitproperty_object (systemdunitproperty_test)
test_2() {
  (systemctl show -p 'UnitFileState' --value 'kdump.service') | grep -qxF 'masked'
}
# systemdunitproperty_object (systemdunitproperty_test)
test_3() {
  (systemctl show -p 'ActiveState' --value 'kdump.service') | grep -qxF 'inactive'
}

if ( test_1 && test_2 && test_3 ); 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
# DISA STIG / SCAP compliance check for kdump service disabled and masked on RHEL 9
if [ ! -x "$(command -v systemctl)" ]; then echo "FAIL"; exit 1; fi
if [ "$(systemctl is-enabled kdump.service)" != "enabled" ]; then :; else systemctl disable --now kdump; fi
if [ "$(systemctl is-enabled kdump.service)" == "enabled" ]; then echo "FAIL"; exit 1; fi
if [ "$(systemctl is-masked kdump.service)" != "masked" ]; then systemctl mask --now kdump; fi
if [ "$(systemctl is-masked kdump.service)" == "masked" ]; then :; else echo "FAIL"; exit 1; fi
if [ "$(systemctl status kdump.service | grep -c "inactive")" -ge 1 ]; then :; else echo "FAIL"; exit 1; fi
echo "PASS"; exit 0

Remediation

Disable and mask the kdump service on RHEL 9.

To disable the kdump service run the following command:

$ sudo systemctl disable --now kdump

To mask the kdump service run the following command:

$ sudo systemctl mask --now kdump