cis-ubuntu2004-v300-1-1-2-1-1

name	cis-ubuntu2004-v300-1-1-2-1-1
description	Ensure /tmp is a separate partition
category	cis-storage
version	3.0.0
author	cyberstrike-official
tags	["cis","ubuntu","linux","ubuntu-20.04","partition"]
cis_id	1.1.2.1.1
cis_benchmark	CIS Ubuntu Linux 20.04 LTS Benchmark v3.0.0
tech_stack	["ubuntu","linux"]
cwe_ids	[]
chains_with	[]
prerequisites	[]
severity_boost	{}

Ensure /tmp is a separate partition

Profile

Level 1 - Server, Level 1 - Workstation, Assessment: Automated

Description

The /tmp directory is a world-writable directory used for temporary storage by all users and some applications.

Note: If an entry for /tmp exists in /etc/fstab it will take precedence over entries in a systemd unit file. There is an exception to this when a system is diskless and connected to iSCSI, entries in /etc/fstab may not take precedence over a systemd unit file.

Rationale

Making /tmp its own file system allows an administrator to set additional mount options such as the noexec option on the mount, making /tmp useless for an attacker to install executable code. It would also prevent an attacker from establishing a hard link to a system setuid program and wait for it to be updated. Once the program was updated, the hard link would be broken, and the attacker would have his own copy of the program. If the program happened to have a security vulnerability, the attacker could continue to exploit the known flaw.

This can be accomplished by either mounting tmpfs to /tmp, or creating a separate partition for /tmp.

Impact

By design files saved to /tmp should have no expectation of surviving a reboot of the system. tmpfs is ram based and all files stored to tmpfs will be lost when the system is rebooted.

If files need to be persistent through a reboot, they should be saved to /var/tmp not /tmp.

Since the /tmp directory is intended to be world-writable, there is a risk of resource exhaustion if it is not bound to tmpfs or a separate partition.

Running out of /tmp space is a problem regardless of what kind of filesystem lies under it, but in a configuration where /tmp is not a separate file system it will essentially have the whole disk available, as the default installation only creates a single / partition. On the other hand, a RAM-based /tmp (as with tmpfs) will almost certainly be much smaller, which can lead to applications filling up the filesystem much more easily. Another alternative is to create a dedicated partition for /tmp from a separate volume or disk. One of the downsides of a disk-based dedicated partition is that it will be slower than which is RAM-based.