Details

Address space layout randomization (ASLR) is an exploit mitigation technique which randomly arranges the address space of key data areas of a process.

Rationale:

Randomly placing virtual memory regions will make it difficult to write memory page exploits as the memory placement will be consistently shifting.

Solution

Set the following parameter in /etc/sysctl.conf or a /etc/sysctl.d/* file:

kernel.randomize_va_space = 2

Run the following command to set the active kernel parameter:

# sysctl -w kernel.randomize_va_space=2

Supportive Information

The following resource is also helpful.

• https://workbench.cisecurity.org/files/3636

This security hardening control applies to the following category of controls within NIST 800-53: Configuration Management.This control applies to the following type of system Unix.

References

• 800-53|CM-6b.
• CCI|CCI-000366
• CSCv6|3.1
• CSCv7|8.3
• Rule-ID|SV-204584r603261_rule
• STIG-ID|RHEL-07-040201

Source

• Tenable.com/audits