Ensure no users have .rhosts files

LowLevel 2Manual reviewcos

Description

While no .rhosts files are shipped by default, users can easily create them. This action is only meaningful if .rhosts support is permitted in the file /etc/pam.conf . Even though the .rhosts files are ineffective if support is disabled in /etc/pam.conf , they may have been brought over from other systems and could contain information useful to an attacker for those other systems.

How it is checked

Audit method: Manual review

This recommendation cannot be checked automatically. A scan lists it with these instructions when you pass --include-manual.

Run the following script and verify no results are returned: #!/bin/bash grep -E -v '^(root|system-halt|sync|system-shutdown)' /etc/passwd | awk -F: '($7 != "'"$(which nologin)"'" && $7 != "/bin/false") { print $1 " " $6 }' | while read user dir; do if [ ! -d "$dir" ]; then echo "The home directory ($dir) of user $user does not exist." else for file in $dir/.rhosts; do if [ ! -h "$file" -a -f "$file" ]; then echo ".rhosts file in $dir" fi done fi done

How it is fixed

Fix method: Guidance or infrastructure patch

Making global modifications to users' files without alerting the user community can result in unexpected outages and unhappy users. Therefore, it is recommended that a monitoring policy be established to report user .rhosts files and determine the action to be taken in accordance with site policy.

Properties

Operating systems: Any
Tags: container-optimized-oscos
Reference: CIS Google Container-Optimized OS Benchmark v1.2.0 - 6.2.14 Ensure no users have .rhosts files