Security

Unsecured systems-management tools can damage hardware and software. It is extremely important that you understand all security risks in your system environment and what you can do to minimize these risks. IBM® Flex System Manager management software offers advanced security capabilities and user-management settings to help you secure your environment.

For educational information about management software security and user management, see User and password management. For an overview of IBM Flex System security, see Security.

Security policies
An IBM Flex System Manager management software security policy is a set of security-related characteristics that define a particular level of protection from security exposures. Depending on its level, the security policy might include account-related policies, communication-protocol enablement, and event-tracking levels.
Password policies
An IBM Flex System Manager management software password policy is a set of criteria that determines how management software passwords are created and how the management software implements password security.
Certificate policies
The IBM Flex System Manager management software certificate policy determines how the management software manages certificates from managed systems. An implicit policy is the default certificate policy for the management software.
Using TLS 1.2
A weakness has been detected in Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) 2.0, SSL 3.0, and Transport Layer Security (TLS) 1.0 when used with Cipher Block Chaining (CBC) encryption mode. This weakness is inherent in the protocol, and has been exploited by a demonstrated attack referred to as the Browser Exploit Against SSL/TLS (BEAST). In addition some security scan tools flag these protocols as being vulnerable. If your environment requires security against this exploit you can use TLS 1.2 in your IBM Flex System Manager environment.
Predefined user IDs and passwords
Predefined user IDs and passwords are included with IBM Flex System Manager management software.
Users, user groups, and roles
IBM Flex System Manager management software offers authentication and user administration options that enable you to specify user privileges for specific tasks and resources. User registry integration, integrity, confidentiality, and secure sockets layer (SSL) supported secure data transmission are other key elements of the management software security.
Access states of managed resources
The Access column in the table view of the IBM Flex System Manager management software web interface displays the access states for managed resources. The access state for a resource is a short description of the connection between the management software and the managed resources (endpoints such as chassis or components installed in chassis). The following list describes the possible access states and procedures for configuring access, if applicable:

Parent topic: Overview of the IBM Flex System management node