AOSX-11-000035 - The operating system must implement DoD-approved encryption to protect the confidentiality of remote access sessions.

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Information

The rexec service must be disabled. The rexec service does not implement crypto and has had several security vulnerabilities in the past. It is disabled by default; enabling it would increase the attack surface of the system.

Without confidentiality protection mechanisms, unauthorized individuals may gain access to sensitive information via a remote access session.

Remote access is access to DoD non-public information systems by an authorized user (or an information system) communicating through an external, non-organization-controlled network. Remote access methods include, for example, dial-up, broadband, and wireless.

Encryption provides a means to secure the remote connection to prevent unauthorized access to the data traversing the remote access connection (e.g., RDP) thereby providing a degree of confidentiality. The encryption strength of mechanism is selected based on the security categorization of the information.false

Solution

To disable the "rexec" service, run the following command:

/usr/bin/sudo /bin/launchctl disable system/com.apple.rexecd

The system may need to be restarted for the update to take effect.

See Also

https://iasecontent.disa.mil/stigs/zip/U_Apple_OS_X_10-11_V1R6_STIG.zip

Item Details

Category: CONFIGURATION MANAGEMENT

References: 800-53|CM-7, CAT|I, CCI|CCI-000068, Rule-ID|SV-81977r1_rule, STIG-ID|AOSX-11-000035, Vuln-ID|V-67487

Plugin: Unix

Control ID: 2775ddff7412f827afc49475f23b9a180221a3ef8e0067629ec49079e985cbeb