Changing the user-account security settings

The user-account security settings control the password complexity, account lockout, and web session inactivity timeout. You can change the values of the settings.

Procedure

Complete the following steps to override the user-account security settings that are in place.

1. From the XClarity Administrator menu bar, click Administration > Security.
2. Click Account Security Settings under the Users and Groups section to display the Users Management page.
3. For each of the following setting that needs to change, select the new value.

   Table 1. Account Security settings

   Security setting	Description	Values
   Password expiration period	The amount of time, in days, that a user can use a password before it must be changed. Smaller values reduce the amount of time for attackers to guess passwords. If set to 0, passwords never expire. The default is 90 days. Note: This setting applies only when the user accounts are managed using the local authentication server. They are not used when the external authentication server is used.	0 – 365
   Password expiration warning period	The amount of time, in days, before the password expiration date that users begin to receive warnings about the impending expiration of the user password. If set to 0, users are never warned. The default is 5 days. Note: This setting applies only when the user accounts are managed using the local authentication server. They are not used when the external authentication server is used.	0 – maximum password expiration setting
   Minimum password reuse cycle	The minimum number of times that a user must enter a unique password when changing the password before the user can start to reuse passwords. If set to 0, users can reuse passwords immediately. The default is 5 occurrences.	0 – 10
   Minimum password change interval	The minimum amount of time, in hours, that must elapse before a user can change a password again after it was previously changed. The value specified for this setting cannot exceed the value specified for the password expiration period. If set to 0, users can change passwords immediately. The default is 24 hours.	0 – 1440
   Maximum number of login failures	The maximum number of times that a user can attempt to log in with an incorrect password before the user account is locked out. The number specified for the lockout period after maximum login failures determines how long the user account is locked out. Accounts that are locked cannot be used to gain access to the system even if a valid password is provided. If set to 0, accounts are never locked. The failed login counter is reset to zero after a successful login. The default is 20 occurrences.	0 – 100
   Lockout period after maximum login failures	The minimum amount of time, in minutes, that must pass before a user that was locked out can attempt to log back in again. If set to 0, the account remains locked until an administrator explicitly unlocks it. A setting of 0 might make your system more exposed to serious denial of service attacks, where deliberate failed login attempts can leave accounts permanently locked. The default is 60 minutes. Tip: Any user with the role of Supervisor can unlock a user account. For more information, see Unlocking a user. Note: This setting applies only when the user accounts are managed using the local authentication server. They are not used when the external authentication server is used.	0 – 2880
   Web inactivity session timeout	The amount of time, in minutes, that a user session that is established with XClarity Administrator can be inactive before the user is logged out. If set to 0, the web session never expires. The default is 1440 minutes. Note: When changing this value, only user sessions that start after the setting is changed are affected.	0 – 1440
   Minimum password length	The minimum number of characters that can be used to specify a valid password. The default is 8 characters.	8 – 20
   Maximum active sessions for a specific user	The maximum number of active sessions for a specific user that is allowed at any given time. If set to 0, the number of allowed active sessions for a specific user is unlimited. The default is 3 sessions.	1 – 20
   Force user to change password on first access	Determine if a user is required to change the password when the user logs in to XClarity Administrator for the first time. The default is to require a user to change the password the first time that the user logs in.	Yes or No

4. Click Apply.