Control: 1.8 Ensure IAM password policy requires minimum length of 14 or greater

Description

Password policies are, in part, used to enforce password complexity requirements. IAM password policies can be used to ensure passwords are at least a given length. It is recommended that the password policy require a minimum password length 14.

Setting a password complexity policy increases account resiliency against brute force login attempts.

Remediation

Perform the following to set the password policy as prescribed:

From Console:

1. Login to AWS Console (with appropriate permissions to View Identity Access Management Account Settings).
2. Goto IAM Service on the AWS Console.
3. Click on Account Settings on the Left Pane.
4. Set "Minimum password length" to 14 or greater.
5. Click "Apply password policy".

From Command Line:

aws iam update-account-password-policy --minimum-password-length 14

Note: All commands starting with "aws iam update-account-password-policy" can be combined into a single command.