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ConfigProof

All controls

SW-MGT-007MediumCisco Catalyst and Nexus

Password hashed with MD5 (type 5)

At a glance

Base severity

Medium

Area

Administrators and Access

Platform

Cisco Catalyst and Nexus

Evidence level

Fact1.00

Benchmark reference

Reads the export, not the device

ConfigProof reads a configuration export. This control is evaluated against the objects in that file, and it reports what the file says. It does not connect to the device and sees no traffic, so a finding here describes the configuration, not what the firewall is doing right now.

Why it matters

Type 5 hashes can be cracked offline far faster than type 8 (PBKDF2) or type 9 (scrypt) hashes once a configuration is exposed.

How to fix it

Web interface

The steps below are written for the web interface. A finding raised on your own export carries the same steps with your object names filled in.

  1. Re-enter the secret with algorithm-type scrypt (type 9) or sha256 (type 8).

Command line

Cisco IOS-XE CLI

configure terminalenable algorithm-type scrypt secret <secret>username <user> privilege 15 algorithm-type scrypt secret <secret>endwrite memory

An example. Values in angle brackets are yours to supply; a finding on your own export fills in the names it read. Typed in configuration mode; copy running-config startup-config saves it, with no separate commit. Read every line first.

Read it back

show running-config | include enable|username
Values to fill in2
<secret>
A new strong secret
<user>
The account name
Before you type it2
  • Written from the Cisco IOS-XE 17 and NX-OS 9 and 10 command references and not run on a device: read each line before you paste it.
  • Confirm your own session is not using the service you are turning off.

How to confirm the fix

  • show running-config | include secret shows type 8 or 9 for every secret.

Limits

  • On NX-OS, type 5 is SHA-256 crypt and is not reported.

Compliance references

No benchmark recommendation is mapped to this control in this version.

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