lowauditverified ✓

Configure the system time zone to UTC or GMT

timezone-utc · UBUNTU ≥ 22 · 1 impl

Description

Audit record timestamps must be mapped to Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) or Greenwich Mean Time (GMT). The system time zone must therefore be set to UTC or GMT.

Rationale

Audit timestamps recorded in a single universal time zone (UTC/GMT) can be correlated across systems and geographic locations during incident analysis. Local time zones complicate cross-system correlation and can obscure the true ordering of events across a fleet.

Check → Remediate

Checkcommand

timedatectl status 2>/dev/null | grep -i 'time zone' | grep -qiE '(UTC|GMT)'

expected_exit:: 0

Remediatecommand_exec

timedatectl set-timezone UTC

unless:: timedatectl status 2>/dev/null | grep -i 'time zone' | grep -qiE '(UTC|GMT)'

Framework references

STIG

V-270820 / UBTU-24-901220V-260521 / UBTU-22-252020

NIST 800-53

AU-8

Live verification

ubuntu22:checkubuntu24:check

#audit#timezone#utc#timestamps#stig