RHEL-07-010482 - Red Hat Enterprise Linux operating systems version 7.2 or newer with a Basic Input/Output System (BIOS) must require authentication upon booting into single-user and maintenance modes.

Information

If the system does not require valid authentication before it boots into single-user or maintenance mode, anyone who invokes single-user or maintenance mode is granted privileged access to all files on the system. GRUB 2 is the default boot loader for RHEL 7 and is designed to require a password to boot into single-user mode or make modifications to the boot menu.

Solution

Configure the system to encrypt the boot password for the grub superusers account with the grub2-setpassword command, which creates/overwrites the /boot/grub2/user.cfg file.

Generate an encrypted grub2 password for the grub superusers account with the following command:

$ sudo grub2-setpassword
Enter password:
Confirm password:

See Also

https://dl.dod.cyber.mil/wp-content/uploads/stigs/zip/U_RHEL_7_V3R15_STIG.zip

Item Details

Category: ACCESS CONTROL

References: 800-53|AC-3, CAT|I, CCI|CCI-000213, Rule-ID|SV-204438r958472_rule, STIG-ID|RHEL-07-010482, STIG-Legacy|SV-95717, STIG-Legacy|V-81005, Vuln-ID|V-204438

Plugin: Unix

Control ID: d123595c4ca6cb6e528b8638ae8a22495acd61de45c33b97a46461d610b7c4dc