STIGUI
V-271806CAT II — Medium severitySV-271806r1092130_rule

OL 9 /etc/passwd file must be group-owned by root.

Rule version OL09-00-002544 · STIG v1 · 2026-08-21

Discussion

The "/etc/passwd" file contains information about the users that are configured on the system. Protection of this file is critical for system security.

Check

Verify that OL 9 configures group ownership of the "/etc/passwd" file with the following command:

$ stat -c "%G %n" /etc/passwd root /etc/passwd

If "/etc/passwd" file does not have a group owner of "root", this is a finding.

Fix

Change the group of the file /etc/passwd to root by running the following command:

$ sudo chgrp root /etc/passwd

Identifiers

Group ID
V-271806
Group title
SRG-OS-000480-GPOS-00227
Rule ID
SV-271806r1092130_rule
Check ID
C-75856r1092128_chk
Fix ID
F-75763r1092129_fix