The macOS system must configure audit log folders to be owned by root.

Overview

Finding ID	Version	Rule ID	IA Controls	Severity
V-268457	APPL-15-001013	SV-268457r1034311_rule		Medium

Description

Audit log folders must be owned by root. The audit service must be configured to create log folders with the correct ownership to prevent normal users from reading audit logs. Audit logs contain sensitive data about the system and users. If log folders are set to be readable and writable only by system administrators, the risk is mitigated. Satisfies: SRG-OS-000057-GPOS-00027, SRG-OS-000058-GPOS-00028, SRG-OS-000059-GPOS-00029, SRG-OS-000256-GPOS-00097, SRG-OS-000257-GPOS-00098, SRG-OS-000258-GPOS-00099

STIG	Date
Apple macOS 15 (Sequoia) Security Technical Implementation Guide	2025-05-05

Details

Check Text (C-72487r1034309_chk)

Verify the macOS system is configured with audit log folders owned by root with the following command:

/bin/ls -dn $(/usr/bin/grep '^dir' /etc/security/audit_control | /usr/bin/awk -F: '{print $2}') | /usr/bin/awk '{print $3}'

If the result is not "0", this is a finding.

Fix Text (F-72388r1034310_fix)

Configure the macOS system with audit log folders owned by root with the following command:

/usr/sbin/chown root /var/audit