Configuring Password Policies; Setting The Password Strength Policy - HP A7533A - Brocade 4Gb SAN Switch Base Administrator's Manual

Configuring password policies

The password policies described in this section apply to the local switch user database only. Configured
password policies (and all user account attribute and password state information) are synchronized across
CPs and remain unchanged after an HA failover. Password policies can also be manually distributed
across the fabric (see
configurable password policies:
• Password strength
• Password history
• Password expiration
• Account lockout
All password policies are enforced during logins to the standby CP. However, you may observe that the
password enforcement behavior on the standby CP is inconsistent with prior login activity because
password state information from the active CP is automatically synchronized with the standby CP, thereby
overwriting any password state information that was previously stored there. Also, password changes are
not permitted on the standby CP.
Password authentication policies configured using the passwdCfg command are not enforced during
initial prompts to change default passwords.

Setting the password strength policy

The password strength policy is enforced across all user accounts, and enforces a set of format rules to
which new passwords must adhere. The password strength policy is enforced only when a new password is
defined. The total of the other password strength policy parameters (lowercase, uppercase, digits, and
punctuation) must be less than or equal to the value of the MinLength parameter.
Use the following attributes to set the password strength policy:
•
Lowercase
Specifies the minimum number of lowercase alphabetic characters that must appear in the password.
The default value is zero. The maximum value must be less than or equal to the MinLength value.
•
Uppercase
Specifies the minimum number of uppercase alphabetic characters that must appear in the password.
The default value is zero. The maximum value must be less than or equal to the MinLength value.
•
Digits
Specifies the minimum number of numeric digits that must appear in the password. The default value is
zero. The maximum value must be less than or equal to the MinLength value.
•
Punctuation
Specifies the minimum number of punctuation characters that must appear in the password. All
printable, non-alphanumeric punctuation characters except colon ( : ) are allowed. The colon character
is not allowed because it is incompatible with Web Tools. The default value is zero. The maximum
value must be less than or equal to the MinLength value.
•
MinLength
Specifies the minimum length of the password. The minimum can be from 8 to 40 characters. New
passwords must between the minimum length specified and 40 characters. The default value is 8. The
maximum value must be greater than or equal to the MinLength value.
•
Repeat
Specifies the length of repeated character sequences that will be disallowed. For example, if the
"repeat" value is set to 3, a password "passAAAword" is disallowed because it contains the repeated
sequence "AAA". A password of "passAAword" would be allowed because no repeated character
sequence exceeds two characters. The range of allowed values is 1 – 40. The default value is 1.
64 Managing user accounts
"Distributing the local user database" on page 63). Following is a list of the