Vulnerability Discussion

The shorter the password, the lower the number of possible combinations that need to be tested before the password is compromised.

Password complexity, or strength, is a measure of the effectiveness of a password in resisting attempts at guessing and brute-force attacks. Password length is one factor of several that helps to determine strength and how long it takes to crack a password. Use of more characters in a password helps to exponentially increase the time and/or resources required to compromise the password.

Check

Verify if the pwquality configuration file enforces a minimum 15-character password length, by running the following command:

# grep -i minlen /etc/security/pwquality.conf
minlen=15

If "minlen" parameter value is not 15 or higher, or is commented out, this is a finding.

Fix

Configure the Ubuntu operating system to enforce a minimum 15-character password length.

Add, or modify the "minlen" parameter value to the "/etc/security/pwquality.conf" file:

minlen=15