STIGhubSTIGhub
STIGsRMF ControlsCompare
STIGhub— A free STIG search and compliance tool·STIGs updated 3 days ago
Powered by Pylon·Privacy·Terms·© 2026 Beacon Cloud Solutions, Inc.
← Back to PostgreSQL 9.x Security Technical Implementation Guide

V-214155

CAT II (Medium)

PostgreSQL must generate audit records when successful accesses to objects occur.

Rule ID

SV-214155r961836_rule

STIG

PostgreSQL 9.x Security Technical Implementation Guide

Version

V2R5

CCIs

CCI-000172

Discussion

Without tracking all or selected types of access to all or selected objects (tables, views, procedures, functions, etc.), it would be difficult to establish, correlate, and investigate the events relating to an incident, or identify those responsible for one. In an SQL environment, types of access include, but are not necessarily limited to: SELECT INSERT UPDATE DELETE EXECUTE

Check Content

As the database administrator, verify pgaudit is enabled by running the following SQL: 

$ sudo su - postgres 
$ psql -c "SHOW shared_preload_libraries" 

If the output does not contain "pgaudit", this is a finding. 

Verify that role, read, write, and ddl auditing are enabled: 

$ psql -c "SHOW pgaudit.log" 

If the output does not contain role, read, write, and ddl, this is a finding.

Fix Text

Note: The following instructions use the PGDATA and PGVER environment variables. See supplementary content APPENDIX-F for instructions on configuring PGDATA and APPENDIX-H for PGVER. To ensure that logging is enabled, review supplementary content APPENDIX-C for instructions on enabling logging. 

If logging is enabled, the following configurations must be made to log unsuccessful connections, date/time, username, and session identifier. 

As the database administrator (shown here as "postgres"), edit postgresql.conf: 

$ sudo su - postgres 
$ vi ${PGDATA?}/postgresql.conf 

Edit the following parameters: 

log_connections = on 
log_line_prefix = '< %m %u %c: >' 
pgaudit.log = 'read, write' 

Where: 
* %m is the time and date 
* %u is the username 
* %c is the session ID for the connection 

As the system administrator, reload the server with the new configuration: 

# SYSTEMD SERVER ONLY 
$ sudo systemctl reload postgresql-${PGVER?}

# INITD SERVER ONLY 
$ sudo service postgresql-${PGVER?} reload