Overview and prerequisites

In HPE Server Automation (SA), Audit and Remediation allows you to identify which objects you want checked, where you want to check for them, and when you want to check them in your IT environment.

• Audit policies define what to check—such as files, directories, configuration values, and so on.
• Audits define where to check—such as servers or multiple servers.
• Audit schedules define when to check—such as one time or as a recurring job.

These capabilities help you understand how to make your managed server environment compliant and how to keep your servers compliant. In SA, you can define server configuration policies to ensure that servers in your facilities meet policy standards. When servers are found to be out of compliance—not configured the way you want them to be—you can remediate them to comply with your organization’s standards.

Using the SA Client, you can audit server configuration values based on a live server or a server snapshot, based on your own custom values, or based on pre-configured audit policies. You can also take server configuration snapshots to capture the current state of a system, so that you can compare other servers against a known baseline.

Audit policies allow you to define company or industry-wide compliance standards, which can then be used inside of audits, snapshot specifications, and other audit policies. Referencing audit policies in your audits or snapshot specifications helps verify that you are up to date with the latest compliance definitions in your organization.

Best practices

If you have a content subscription to BSA Essentials Subscription Services, you can be kept up to date on the latest industry compliance standard, based on the needs of your data center. For example, Subscription Services give you access to regularly updated security best practices, such as the Center for Internet Security (CIS), Payment Card Industry (PCI), and so on. It also enables access to additional free non-subscription content such as Microsoft Patch Supplement for Server Automation. BSA Essentials Subscription Services enables you to access the most current regulatory compliance policies, such as Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA, Sarbanes-Oxley, and daily vulnerability alerts. You can also join the content developer communities on the HPE Live Network (HPELN) portal to share and access custom-created audit policies and rules. For information about subscribing to BSA Essentials Subscription Services, contact your sales representative.

See the SA Support Matrix for detailed information about supported operating systems for audit and remediation.