STIGUI
V-277067CAT II — Medium severitySV-277067r1148653_rule

The macOS system must configure audit log files to mode 440 or less permissive.

Rule version APPL-26-001016 · STIG v1 · 2026-09-01

Discussion

The audit service must be configured to create log files that are readable only by the root user and group wheel. To achieve this, audit log files must be configured to mode 440 or less permissive to prevent normal users from reading, modifying, or deleting audit logs.

Satisfies: SRG-OS-000057-GPOS-00027, SRG-OS-000058-GPOS-00028, SRG-OS-000059-GPOS-00029, SRG-OS-000256-GPOS-00097, SRG-OS-000257-GPOS-00098, SRG-OS-000258-GPOS-00099

Check

Verify the macOS system is configured with audit log files set to mode 440 or less with the following command:

/bin/ls -l $(/usr/bin/grep '^dir' /etc/security/audit_control | /usr/bin/awk -F: '{print $2}') | /usr/bin/awk '!/-r--r-----|current|total/{print $1}' | /usr/bin/wc -l | /usr/bin/tr -d ' '

If the result is not "0", this is a finding.

Fix

Configure the macOS system with audit log files set to mode 440 with the following command:

/bin/chmod 440 /var/audit/*

Identifiers

Group ID
V-277067
Group title
SRG-OS-000057-GPOS-00027
Rule ID
SV-277067r1148653_rule
Check ID
C-81222r1148651_chk
Fix ID
F-81127r1148652_fix