Why are the pam_tally and pam_tally2 failed attempts count wrong, with sudo?

Solution Unverified - Updated -

Issue

  • When activating pam_tally.so or pam_tally2.so in system-auth-ac, and the following command is excecuted, the faillog counter is increased before any password is given by user:
$ sudo -k su -
  • After one wrong password is typed in, the faillog counter is again increased (to 2)

Environment

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6

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