Enable GNOME3 Login Warning Banner

Docs > Datadog Security > OOTB Rules > Enable GNOME3 Login Warning Banner

Description

In the default graphical environment, displaying a login warning banner in the GNOME Display Manager’s login screen can be enabled on the login screen by setting banner-message-enable to true.

To enable, add or edit banner-message-enable to /etc/dconf/db/gdm.d/00-security-settings. For example:

[org/gnome/login-screen]
banner-message-enable=true

Once the setting has been added, add a lock to /etc/dconf/db/gdm.d/locks/00-security-settings-lock to prevent user modification. For example:

/org/gnome/login-screen/banner-message-enable

After the settings have been set, run dconf update. The banner text must also be set.

Rationale

Display of a standardized and approved use notification before granting access to the operating system ensures privacy and security notification verbiage used is consistent with applicable federal laws, Executive Orders, directives, policies, regulations, standards, and guidance.

For U.S. Government systems, system use notifications are required only for access via login interfaces with human users and are not required when such human interfaces do not exist.

Remediation

Shell script

The following script can be run on the host to remediate the issue.

#!/bin/bash

# Remediation is applicable only in certain platforms
if dpkg-query --show --showformat='${db:Status-Status}\n' 'gdm3' 2>/dev/null | grep -q installed; then

# Check for setting in any of the DConf db directories
# If files contain ibus or distro, ignore them.
# The assignment assumes that individual filenames don't contain :
readarray -t SETTINGSFILES < <(grep -r "\\[org/gnome/login-screen\\]" "/etc/dconf/db/" \
                                | grep -v 'distro\|ibus\|gdm.d' | cut -d":" -f1)
DCONFFILE="/etc/dconf/db/gdm.d/00-security-settings"
DBDIR="/etc/dconf/db/gdm.d"

mkdir -p "${DBDIR}"

# Comment out the configurations in databases different from the target one
if [ "${#SETTINGSFILES[@]}" -ne 0 ]
then
    if grep -q "^\\s*banner-message-enable\\s*=" "${SETTINGSFILES[@]}"
    then
        
        sed -Ei "s/(^\s*)banner-message-enable(\s*=)/#\1banner-message-enable\2/g" "${SETTINGSFILES[@]}"
    fi
fi

[ ! -z "${DCONFFILE}" ] && echo "" >> "${DCONFFILE}"
if ! grep -q "\\[org/gnome/login-screen\\]" "${DCONFFILE}"
then
    printf '%s\n' "[org/gnome/login-screen]" >> ${DCONFFILE}
fi

escaped_value="$(sed -e 's/\\/\\\\/g' <<< "true")"
if grep -q "^\\s*banner-message-enable\\s*=" "${DCONFFILE}"
then
        sed -i "s/\\s*banner-message-enable\\s*=\\s*.*/banner-message-enable=${escaped_value}/g" "${DCONFFILE}"
    else
        sed -i "\\|\\[org/gnome/login-screen\\]|a\\banner-message-enable=${escaped_value}" "${DCONFFILE}"
fi

dconf update
# Check for setting in any of the DConf db directories
LOCKFILES=$(grep -r "^/org/gnome/login-screen/banner-message-enable$" "/etc/dconf/db/" \
            | grep -v 'distro\|ibus\|gdm.d' | grep ":" | cut -d":" -f1)
LOCKSFOLDER="/etc/dconf/db/gdm.d/locks"

mkdir -p "${LOCKSFOLDER}"

# Comment out the configurations in databases different from the target one
if [[ ! -z "${LOCKFILES}" ]]
then
    sed -i -E "s|^/org/gnome/login-screen/banner-message-enable$|#&|" "${LOCKFILES[@]}"
fi

if ! grep -qr "^/org/gnome/login-screen/banner-message-enable$" /etc/dconf/db/gdm.d/
then
    echo "/org/gnome/login-screen/banner-message-enable" >> "/etc/dconf/db/gdm.d/locks/00-security-settings-lock"
fi

dconf update

else
    >&2 echo 'Remediation is not applicable, nothing was done'
fi