Using a security checklist for system setup

Previously, I told you about OpenSCAP, which is a really useful tool for locking down your system with just a minimal amount of effort. OpenSCAP comes with various profiles that you can apply to help bring your systems into compliance with the standards of different regulatory agencies. However, there are certain things that OpenSCAP can’t do for you. For example, certain regulatory agencies require that your server’s hard drive be partitioned in a certain way, with certain directories separated out into their own partitions. If you’ve already set up your server with everything under one big partition, you can’t fix that just by doing a remediation procedure with OpenSCAP. The process of locking down your server to ensure that it’s compliant with any applicable security regulations has to begin before you even install the operating system. For this, you need the appropriate checklist.

There are a few...