Book Image

Mastering Linux Security and Hardening - Third Edition

By : Donald A. Tevault
3.7 (7)
Book Image

Mastering Linux Security and Hardening - Third Edition

3.7 (7)
By: Donald A. Tevault

Overview of this book

The third edition of Mastering Linux Security and Hardening is an updated, comprehensive introduction to implementing the latest Linux security measures, using the latest versions of Ubuntu and AlmaLinux. In this new edition, you will learn how to set up a practice lab, create user accounts with appropriate privilege levels, protect sensitive data with permissions settings and encryption, and configure a firewall with the newest firewall technologies. You’ll also explore how to use sudo to set up administrative accounts with only the privileges required to do a specific job, and you’ll get a peek at the new sudo features that have been added over the past couple of years. You’ll also see updated information on how to set up a local certificate authority for both Ubuntu and AlmaLinux, as well as how to automate system auditing. Other important skills that you’ll learn include how to automatically harden systems with OpenSCAP, audit systems with auditd, harden the Linux kernel configuration, protect your systems from malware, and perform vulnerability scans of your systems. As a bonus, you’ll see how to use Security Onion to set up an Intrusion Detection System. By the end of this new edition, you will confidently be able to set up a Linux server that will be secure and harder for malicious actors to compromise.
Table of Contents (22 chapters)
1
Section 1: Setting up a Secure Linux System
9
Section 2: Mastering File and Directory Access Control (DAC)
12
Section 3: Advanced System Hardening Techniques
20
Other Books You May Enjoy
21
Index

Securely configuring BIOS/UEFI

This topic is different from anything we’ve looked at thus far because it has nothing to do with the operating system. Rather, we’re now going to talk about the computer hardware.

Every computer motherboard has either a BIOS or a UEFI chip, which stores both the hardware configuration for the computer and the bootstrap instructions that are needed to start the boot process after the power is turned on. UEFI has replaced the old-style BIOS on newer motherboards, and it has more security features than the old BIOS had.

I can’t give you any specific information about BIOS/UEFI setup because every model motherboard has a different way of doing things. What I can give you is some more generalized information.

When you think about BIOS/UEFI security, you might be thinking about disabling the ability to boot from anything other than the normal system drive. In the following screenshot, you see that I’ve disabled all SATA...