Friday, June 02, 2017

PASSWORD_REUSE_MAX and PASSWORD_REUSE_TIME

I tested this on Oracle 11.2. I created a profile called FOR_ANDREW with PASSWORD_REUSE_MAX set to 1. This meant that I could not reuse a password until I had used one other password first:
 
SQL> conn / as sysdba
Connected.
 
SQL> create profile for_andrew
  2  limit password_reuse_max 1
  3  /
 
Profile created.
 
SQL>
 
I created a user called ANDREW and gave him the FOR_ANDREW profile:
 
SQL> create user andrew
  2  identified by old_password
  3  profile for_andrew
  4  /
 
User created.
 
SQL> grant create session to andrew
  2  /
 
Grant succeeded.
 
SQL>
 
I connected to the database as user ANDREW:
 
SQL> conn andrew/old_password
Connected.
SQL>
 
I tried to reuse the existing password but this failed as I had expected it would:
 
SQL> alter user andrew
  2  identified by old_password
  3  /
alter user andrew
*
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-28007: the password cannot be reused
 
SQL>
 
I used a different password before trying to reuse the original one. This failed with the same error, which I had not expected:
 
SQL> alter user andrew
  2  identified by new_password
  3  /
 
User altered.
 
SQL> alter user andrew
  2  identified by old_password
  3  /
alter user andrew
*
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-28007: the password cannot be reused
 
SQL>
 
I did some research and saw that the PASSWORD_REUSE_TIME was set to DEFAULT. This meant that it had the same value as the DEFAULT profile where it was set to UNLIMITED:
 
SQL> conn / as sysdba
Connected.
SQL> select limit from dba_profiles
  2  where profile = 'FOR_ANDREW'
  3  and resource_name = 'PASSWORD_REUSE_TIME'
  4  /
 
LIMIT
----------------------------------------
DEFAULT
 
SQL> select limit from dba_profiles
  2  where profile = 'DEFAULT'
  3  and resource_name = 'PASSWORD_REUSE_TIME'
  4  /
 
LIMIT
----------------------------------------
UNLIMITED
 
SQL>
 
According to the Oracle 11.1 documentation:
 
These two parameters must be set in conjunction with each other. PASSWORD_REUSE_TIME specifies the number of days before which a password cannot be reused. PASSWORD_REUSE_MAX specifies the number of password changes required before the current password can be reused.
 
It then went on to say:

For these parameter to have any effect, you must specify an integer for both of them. 

... which I found a bit misleading. However, it clarified this a few lines later as follows: 

If you specify an integer for either of these parameters and specify UNLIMITED for the other, then the user can never reuse a password. 

I set PASSWORD_REUSE_TIME to 1 minute and checked that I still could not reinstate the original password:

SQL> alter profile for_andrew
  2  limit password_reuse_time 1/1440
  3  /
 
Profile altered.
 
SQL> conn andrew/new_password
Connected.
SQL> alter user andrew
  2  identified by old_password
  3  /
alter user andrew
*
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-28007: the password cannot be reused
 
SQL>
 
However, I waited for a minute and found that I could:
 
SQL> exec sys.dbms_lock.sleep(60);
 
PL/SQL procedure successfully completed.
 
SQL> alter user andrew
  2  identified by old_password
  3  /
 
User altered.
 
SQL>
 
I do not know which Oracle process controls this functionality but it seemed a bit hit and miss. When I repeated the test, I sometimes found I had to wait more than a minute before I could change the password back to its original value. 

No comments:

Post a Comment