STIGUI
V-277149CAT II — Medium severitySV-277149r1148899_rule

The macOS system must remove password hints from user accounts.

Rule version APPL-26-003014 · STIG v1 · 2026-09-01

Discussion

User accounts must not contain password hints.

Password hints leak information about passwords in use and can lead to loss of confidentiality.

Check

Verify the macOS system is configured to remove password hints from user accounts with the following command:

HINT=$(/usr/bin/dscl . -list /Users hint | /usr/bin/awk '{ print $2 }')

if [ -z "$HINT" ]; then echo "PASS" else echo "FAIL" fi

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

Fix

Configure the macOS system to remove password hints from user accounts with the following command:

for u in $(/usr/bin/dscl . -list /Users UniqueID | /usr/bin/awk '$2 > 500 {print $1}'); do /usr/bin/dscl . -delete /Users/$u hint done

Identifiers

Group ID
V-277149
Group title
SRG-OS-000079-GPOS-00047
Rule ID
SV-277149r1148899_rule
Check ID
C-81304r1148897_chk
Fix ID
F-81209r1148898_fix