The system-wide cryptographic policies is a system component that configures the core cryptographic subsystems, covering the TLS, IPsec, SSH, DNSSec, and Kerberos protocols

List current policy

# update-crypto-policies --show
DEFAULT

# update-crypto-policies --set <POLICY>
<POLICY>
# reboot

RHEL 9 contains the following predefined policies:

• DEFAULT
  

The default system-wide cryptographic policy level offers secure settings for current threat models. It allows the TLS 1.2 and 1.3 protocols, as well as the IKEv2 and SSH2 protocols. The RSA keys and Diffie-Hellman parameters are accepted if they are at least 2048 bits long.

• LEGACY
  

Ensures maximum compatibility with Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 and earlier; it is less secure due to an increased attack surface. SHA-1 is allowed to be used as TLS hash, signature, and algorithm. CBC-mode ciphers are allowed to be used with SSH. Applications using GnuTLS allow certificates signed with SHA-1. It allows the TLS 1.2 and 1.3 protocols, as well as the IKEv2 and SSH2 protocols. The RSA keys and Diffie-Hellman parameters are accepted if they are at least 2048 bits long.

• FUTURE
  

A stricter forward-looking security level intended for testing a possible future policy. This policy does not allow the use of SHA-1 in DNSSec or as an HMAC. SHA2-224 and SHA3-224 hashes are rejected. 128-bit ciphers are disabled. CBC-mode ciphers are disabled except in Kerberos. It allows the TLS 1.2 and 1.3 protocols, as well as the IKEv2 and SSH2 protocols. The RSA keys and Diffie-Hellman parameters are accepted if they are at least 3072 bits long. If your system communicates on the public internet, you might face interoperability problems.

• FIPS
  

Conforms with the FIPS 140 requirements. The fips-mode-setup tool, which switches the RHEL system into FIPS mode, uses this policy internally. Switching to the FIPS policy does not guarantee compliance with the FIPS 140 standard. You also must re-generate all cryptographic keys after you set the system to FIPS mode. This is not possible in many scenarios.

The naming of these files must follow the following convention: <MODULE>.pmod, where <MODULE> is the name of the modifier in uppercase without spaces, and .pmod is the file extension in lowercase.

The location of these files should be /etc/crypto-policies/policies/modules folder (or the /usr/share/crypto-policies/policies/modules folder if they are in installed packages).

[root@lnxa100 crypto-policies]# cat /usr/share/crypto-policies/DEFAULT/opensshserver.txt
CRYPTO_POLICY='-oCiphers=aes256-gcm@openssh.com,chacha20-poly1305@openssh.com,aes256-ctr,aes256-cbc,aes128-gcm@openssh.com,aes128-ctr,aes128-cbc -oMACs=hmac-sha2-256-etm@openssh.com,hmac-sha1-etm@openssh.com,umac-128-etm@openssh.com,hmac-sha2-512-etm@openssh.com,hmac-sha2-256,hmac-sha1,umac-128@openssh.com,hmac-sha2-512 -oGSSAPIKexAlgorithms=gss-curve25519-sha256-,gss-nistp256-sha256-,gss-group14-sha256-,gss-group16-sha512-,gss-gex-sha1-,gss-group14-sha1- -oKexAlgorithms=curve25519-sha256,curve25519-sha256@libssh.org,ecdh-sha2-nistp256,ecdh-sha2-nistp384,ecdh-sha2-nistp521,diffie-hellman-group-exchange-sha256,diffie-hellman-group14-sha256,diffie-hellman-group16-sha512,diffie-hellman-group18-sha512,diffie-hellman-group-exchange-sha1,diffie-hellman-group14-sha1 -oHostKeyAlgorithms=ecdsa-sha2-nistp256,ecdsa-sha2-nistp256-cert-v01@openssh.com,ecdsa-sha2-nistp384,ecdsa-sha2-nistp384-cert-v01@openssh.com,ecdsa-sha2-nistp521,ecdsa-sha2-nistp521-cert-v01@openssh.com,ssh-ed25519,ssh-ed25519-cert-v01@openssh.com,rsa-sha2-256,rsa-sha2-256-cert-v01@openssh.com,rsa-sha2-512,rsa-sha2-512-cert-v01@openssh.com,ssh-rsa,ssh-rsa-cert-v01@openssh.com -oPubkeyAcceptedKeyTypes=ecdsa-sha2-nistp256,ecdsa-sha2-nistp256-cert-v01@openssh.com,ecdsa-sha2-nistp384,ecdsa-sha2-nistp384-cert-v01@openssh.com,ecdsa-sha2-nistp521,ecdsa-sha2-nistp521-cert-v01@openssh.com,ssh-ed25519,ssh-ed25519-cert-v01@openssh.com,rsa-sha2-256,rsa-sha2-256-cert-v01@openssh.com,rsa-sha2-512,rsa-sha2-512-cert-v01@openssh.com,ssh-rsa,ssh-rsa-cert-v01@openssh.com -oCASignatureAlgorithms=ecdsa-sha2-nistp256,ecdsa-sha2-nistp384,ecdsa-sha2-nistp521,ssh-ed25519,rsa-sha2-256,rsa-sha2-512,ssh-rsa'

[root@lnxa100 crypto-policies]# cat /usr/share/crypto-policies/DEFAULT/openssh.txt
Ciphers aes256-gcm@openssh.com,chacha20-poly1305@openssh.com,aes256-ctr,aes256-cbc,aes128-gcm@openssh.com,aes128-ctr,aes128-cbc
MACs hmac-sha2-256-etm@openssh.com,hmac-sha1-etm@openssh.com,umac-128-etm@openssh.com,hmac-sha2-512-etm@openssh.com,hmac-sha2-256,hmac-sha1,umac-128@openssh.com,hmac-sha2-512
GSSAPIKexAlgorithms gss-curve25519-sha256-,gss-nistp256-sha256-,gss-group14-sha256-,gss-group16-sha512-,gss-gex-sha1-,gss-group14-sha1-
KexAlgorithms curve25519-sha256,curve25519-sha256@libssh.org,ecdh-sha2-nistp256,ecdh-sha2-nistp384,ecdh-sha2-nistp521,diffie-hellman-group-exchange-sha256,diffie-hellman-group14-sha256,diffie-hellman-group16-sha512,diffie-hellman-group18-sha512,diffie-hellman-group-exchange-sha1,diffie-hellman-group14-sha1
PubkeyAcceptedKeyTypes ecdsa-sha2-nistp256,ecdsa-sha2-nistp256-cert-v01@openssh.com,ecdsa-sha2-nistp384,ecdsa-sha2-nistp384-cert-v01@openssh.com,ecdsa-sha2-nistp521,ecdsa-sha2-nistp521-cert-v01@openssh.com,ssh-ed25519,ssh-ed25519-cert-v01@openssh.com,rsa-sha2-256,rsa-sha2-256-cert-v01@openssh.com,rsa-sha2-512,rsa-sha2-512-cert-v01@openssh.com,ssh-rsa,ssh-rsa-cert-v01@openssh.com
CASignatureAlgorithms ecdsa-sha2-nistp256,ecdsa-sha2-nistp384,ecdsa-sha2-nistp521,ssh-ed25519,rsa-sha2-256,rsa-sha2-512,ssh-rsa

[root@lnxa100 crypto-policies]# cat FUTURE/opensshserver.txt
CRYPTO_POLICY='-oCiphers=aes256-gcm@openssh.com,chacha20-poly1305@openssh.com,aes256-ctr -oMACs=hmac-sha2-256-etm@openssh.com,umac-128-etm@openssh.com,hmac-sha2-512-etm@openssh.com,hmac-sha2-256,umac-128@openssh.com,hmac-sha2-512 -oGSSAPIKexAlgorithms=gss-curve25519-sha256-,gss-nistp256-sha256-,gss-group16-sha512- -oKexAlgorithms=curve25519-sha256,curve25519-sha256@libssh.org,ecdh-sha2-nistp256,ecdh-sha2-nistp384,ecdh-sha2-nistp521,diffie-hellman-group-exchange-sha256,diffie-hellman-group16-sha512,diffie-hellman-group18-sha512 -oHostKeyAlgorithms=ecdsa-sha2-nistp256,ecdsa-sha2-nistp256-cert-v01@openssh.com,ecdsa-sha2-nistp384,ecdsa-sha2-nistp384-cert-v01@openssh.com,ecdsa-sha2-nistp521,ecdsa-sha2-nistp521-cert-v01@openssh.com,ssh-ed25519,ssh-ed25519-cert-v01@openssh.com,rsa-sha2-256,rsa-sha2-256-cert-v01@openssh.com,rsa-sha2-512,rsa-sha2-512-cert-v01@openssh.com -oPubkeyAcceptedKeyTypes=ecdsa-sha2-nistp256,ecdsa-sha2-nistp256-cert-v01@openssh.com,ecdsa-sha2-nistp384,ecdsa-sha2-nistp384-cert-v01@openssh.com,ecdsa-sha2-nistp521,ecdsa-sha2-nistp521-cert-v01@openssh.com,ssh-ed25519,ssh-ed25519-cert-v01@openssh.com,rsa-sha2-256,rsa-sha2-256-cert-v01@openssh.com,rsa-sha2-512,rsa-sha2-512-cert-v01@openssh.com -oCASignatureAlgorithms=ecdsa-sha2-nistp256,ecdsa-sha2-nistp384,ecdsa-sha2-nistp521,ssh-ed25519,rsa-sha2-256,rsa-sha2-512'

[root@lnxa100 crypto-policies]# cat FUTURE/openssh.txt
Ciphers aes256-gcm@openssh.com,chacha20-poly1305@openssh.com,aes256-ctr
MACs hmac-sha2-256-etm@openssh.com,umac-128-etm@openssh.com,hmac-sha2-512-etm@openssh.com,hmac-sha2-256,umac-128@openssh.com,hmac-sha2-512
GSSAPIKexAlgorithms gss-curve25519-sha256-,gss-nistp256-sha256-,gss-group16-sha512-
KexAlgorithms curve25519-sha256,curve25519-sha256@libssh.org,ecdh-sha2-nistp256,ecdh-sha2-nistp384,ecdh-sha2-nistp521,diffie-hellman-group-exchange-sha256,diffie-hellman-group16-sha512,diffie-hellman-group18-sha512
PubkeyAcceptedKeyTypes ecdsa-sha2-nistp256,ecdsa-sha2-nistp256-cert-v01@openssh.com,ecdsa-sha2-nistp384,ecdsa-sha2-nistp384-cert-v01@openssh.com,ecdsa-sha2-nistp521,ecdsa-sha2-nistp521-cert-v01@openssh.com,ssh-ed25519,ssh-ed25519-cert-v01@openssh.com,rsa-sha2-256,rsa-sha2-256-cert-v01@openssh.com,rsa-sha2-512,rsa-sha2-512-cert-v01@openssh.com
CASignatureAlgorithms ecdsa-sha2-nistp256,ecdsa-sha2-nistp384,ecdsa-sha2-nistp521,ssh-ed25519,rsa-sha2-256,rsa-sha2-512