Amazon Linux 2023 must ensure a sticky bit be set on all public directories.

Severity	Group ID	Group Title	Version	Rule ID	Date	STIG Version
medium	V-274164	SRG-OS-000138-GPOS-00069	AZLX-23-002500	SV-274164r1120480_rule	2025-07-15	1

Description
Preventing unauthorized information transfers mitigates the risk of information, including encrypted representations of information, produced by the actions of prior users/roles (or the actions of processes acting on behalf of prior users/roles) from being available to any current users/roles (or current processes) that obtain access to shared system resources (e.g., registers, main memory, hard disks) after those resources have been released back to information systems. The control of information in shared resources is also commonly referred to as object reuse and residual information protection. This requirement generally applies to the design of an information technology product, but it can also apply to the configuration of particular information system components that are, or use, such products. This can be verified by acceptance/validation processes in DOD or other government agencies. There may be shared resources with configurable protections (e.g., files in storage) that may be assessed on specific information system components.

Description

Preventing unauthorized information transfers mitigates the risk of information, including encrypted representations of information, produced by the actions of prior users/roles (or the actions of processes acting on behalf of prior users/roles) from being available to any current users/roles (or current processes) that obtain access to shared system resources (e.g., registers, main memory, hard disks) after those resources have been released back to information systems. The control of information in shared resources is also commonly referred to as object reuse and residual information protection. This requirement generally applies to the design of an information technology product, but it can also apply to the configuration of particular information system components that are, or use, such products. This can be verified by acceptance/validation processes in DOD or other government agencies. There may be shared resources with configurable protections (e.g., files in storage) that may be assessed on specific information system components.

ℹ️ Check
Verify Amazon Linux 2023 world-writable directories have the sticky bit set. Determine if all world-writable directories have the sticky bit set by running the following command: $ sudo find / -type d -perm -0002 ! -perm -1000 -exec ls -ld {} + If any output is returned, these directories are world-writable and do not have the sticky bit set, and this is a finding.

✔️ Fix
Configure Amazon Linux 2023 world-writable directories to have the sticky bit set to prevent unauthorized and unintended information transferred via shared system resources. Set the sticky bit on all world-writable directories using the following command: $ sudo find / -type d -perm -0002 ! -perm -1000 -exec chmod +t {} +