MADB-10-003900 - If passwords are used for authentication, MariaDB must transmit only encrypted representations of passwords.

Information

The DoD standard for authentication is DoD-approved PKI certificates.

Authentication based on User ID and Password may be used only when it is not possible to employ a PKI certificate and requires AO approval.

In such cases, passwords need to be protected at all times, and encryption is the standard method for protecting passwords during transmission.

DBMS passwords sent in clear text format across the network are vulnerable to discovery by unauthorized users. Disclosure of passwords may easily lead to unauthorized access to the database.

NOTE: Nessus has not performed this check. Please review the benchmark to ensure target compliance.

Solution

As the administrator locate the MariaDB configuration file to change. This varies depending on setup and how configuration files are managed but should be in /etc/my.cnf.d/. It is recommended to have a separate configuration file within this directory for SSL connection information.

In the [server] section add the lines for SSL:

ssl
ssl-ca=/path/to/ssl/ca-cert.pem
ssl-cert=/path/to/ssl/server-cert.pem
ssl-key=/path/to/ssl/server-key.pem

Restart of the MariaDB Server and verify SSL is being used.

MariaDB> STATUS;

Verify line beginning with 'SSL:'.

See Also

https://dl.dod.cyber.mil/wp-content/uploads/stigs/zip/U_MariaDB_Enterprise_10-x_V2R1_STIG.zip

Item Details

Category: IDENTIFICATION AND AUTHENTICATION

References: 800-53|IA-5(1)(c), CAT|I, CCI|CCI-000197, Rule-ID|SV-253698r961029_rule, STIG-ID|MADB-10-003900, Vuln-ID|V-253698

Plugin: MySQLDB

Control ID: 9d5921d2a6505908fe761a045cd3735bf980b102aaf7e4ebcab35b7b8449b398