E8 - Australian Cyber Security Centre Essential 8

Essential Eight (E8) is a cybersecurity framework published by the Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC) to help organizations mitigate cybersecurity risks. It is a reference baseline for traditional government environments. 

Red Hat has published a hardening guide for OpenShift: Australian E8 and ISM.

Built-in compliance capabilities

Red Hat products have built-in capabilities that help you to align with the E8 policy. By using integrations with the system management solutions available in our portfolio, you can align the configuration of the machine with the requirements. However, the result is not full compliance - you always need to review the results and take the context of your specific deployment into account.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux

To configure RHEL systems, use only the profiles provided in the particular minor release of RHEL. This is because the hardening components and Security Content Automation Protocol (SCAP) content might not be compatible with earlier versions.

Use the following profile ID to align your RHEL system with E8: 

xccdf_org.ssgproject.content_profile_e8

You can install the system already pre-configured to E8 by using RHEL image builder:

• RHEL 10: Creating pre-hardened images with RHEL image builder OpenSCAP integration
• RHEL 9: Creating pre-hardened images with RHEL image builder OpenSCAP integration

Note that this is integrated also in the Red Hat Insights, linked below.

If you prefer a kickstart-based installation, the method is described in the RHEL security guide:

• RHEL 10: Performing a hardened installation of RHEL with Kickstart
• RHEL 9: Kickstart-based installation of compliant systems

You can build and deploy hardened bootable images pre-configured to E8 for RHEL Image mode:

• RHEL 10: Security hardening and compliance of bootable images
• RHEL 9: Security hardening and compliance of bootable images

You can check the system configuration during runtime by using the OpenSCAP command-line tool:

• RHEL 10: Scanning the system for configuration compliance
• RHEL 9: Scanning the system for configuration compliance and vulnerabilities
• RHEL 8: Scanning the system for configuration compliance and vulnerabilities
• RHEL 7: Scanning the System for Configuration Compliance and Vulnerabilities

Red Hat Satellite

You can plan and configure compliance policies, deploy the policies to hosts, and monitor the compliance of your hosts in Red Hat Satellite. For more information, see the product documentation:

• Managing Security Compliance

Red Hat Insights for RHEL

You can create and manage your custom security policies entirely within the compliance service UI, as well as monitor the compliance state of your systems, remediate any discrepancies, and use the custom security policies in image builder to deploy additional systems:

• Managing SCAP security policies in the Insights for RHEL compliance service

Red Hat OpenShift

You can automate the inspection of numerous technical implementations and compare them against certain aspects of industry standards, benchmarks, and baselines.

• Compliance Operator

Essential Eight | Cyber.gov.au