Security

Red Hat® Enterprise Linux® v. 5 running on Altix® and Altix® XE servers is targeted for completion of Labeled Security Protection Profile (LSPP) certification in the 4th quarter calendar year 2007. This will be the first certification for LSPP for SGI Linux-based systems. The new LSPP and RBAC functionality was co-developed by the NSA (SELinux), IBM, HP, and Red Hat and was accepted into the Linux community tree.

As of October, 2006, Red Hat Enterprise Linux v. 4 (update 4) running on Altix achieved certification for Controlled Access Protection Profile (CAPP) at Evaluation Assurance Level (EAL)3+. This certification was completed by NIAP in the US and it covers all Altix servers including the A4700.

TOE security features:

  • Identification and Authentication using pluggable authentication modules (PAM) and a password-based authentication mechanism.
  • Audit using the standard community linux audit system with the associated administrative interfaces. This system provides the capability to audit a large number of events including individual system calls as well as events generated by trusted processes. The system administrator can define a rule base to restrict auditing to the events he is interested in. This includes the ability to restrict auditing to specific events, specific users, specific objects or a combination of all of this.
  • Discretionary Access Control (DAC) providing the standard UNIX permission bit mechanism and access control lists (ACLs). Access control mechanisms also protect IPC objects from unauthorized access.
  • Object reuse functionality to clear file system objects as well as memory and IPC objects before they can be reused by a process belonging to a different user.
  • Security Management performed by administrative users.
  • Secure communication is provided with applications implementing the SSH v2 and SSL v3 cryptographic protocols when communicating over insecure networks.
  • TSF Protection: While in operation, the kernel software and data are protected by the hardware memory protection mechanisms. The memory and process management components of the kernel ensure a user process cannot access kernel storage or storage belonging to other processes. Non-kernel TSF software and data are protected by DAC and process isolation mechanisms.
  • The cryptography used in this product was tested using a cipher compliance test approach, which used the methodology proscribed by the NIST Cryptographic Algorithm Validation Scheme. Those security functions included as FIPS Approved functions were tested by the cryptographic test laboratory and validated by NIST's Cryptographic Algorithm Validation Program.

The certification can be found at http://www.niap-ccevs.org/cc-scheme/st/?vid=10163

As of October, 2005, SUSE™ LINUX Enterprise Server running on Altix® 3700 Bx2 supercomputer and Altix® 350 mid-range servers has been certified for Controlled Access Protection Profile (CAPP) at Evaluation Assurance Level 3+ (EAL3+).

The Target of Evaluation (TOE) was SUSE LINUX Enterprise Server Version 9 with Service Pack 2 with SGI ProPack™ 4, Service Pack 2. The TOE security features include:

  • Identification and Authentication using pluggable authentication modules (PAM) and a password-based authentication mechanism
  • Audit using the LAuS system with the associated administrative interfaces
  • Discretionary Access Control (DAC) providing the standard UNIX permission bit mechanism and access control lists (ACLs) on the ext3 and XFS® file systems
  • Object reuse functionality to clear file system and memory objects before re-use
  • Security Management performed by administrative users
  • Secure communication is provided with applications implementing the SSHv2 and SSLv3 cryptographic protocols when communicating over insecure networks
  • TSF Protection: TSF data is protected by the DAC mechanism. Kernel software and data are protected by hardware protection mechanisms provided through the TOE environment.

The TOE is conformant to the protection profile of CAPP, issue 1.d, 8 October 1999. The requirements of EAL3 and ALC_FLR.3 are fulfilled. The minimum strength of function is: SOF-medium.