Review User-Defined Roles
Scanned 5/30/2026
Install via CLI
openskills install CyberStrikeus/CyberStrike---
name: cis-cassandra40-v100-3.7
description: "Review User-Defined Roles"
category: cis-cassandra
version: "1.0.0"
author: cyberstrike-official
tags: [cis, cassandra, access-control, roles]
cis_id: "3.7"
cis_benchmark: "CIS Apache Cassandra 4.0 Benchmark v1.0.0"
tech_stack: [cassandra]
cwe_ids: []
chains_with: []
prerequisites: []
severity_boost: {}
---
# 3.7 Review User-Defined Roles
## Profile Applicability
- Level 1 - Cassandra
- Level 1 - Cassandra on Linux
## Description
The `MEMBER_OF` column found in the `system_auth.roles` table shows roles granted to roles.
## Rationale
The `MEMBER_OF` column shows whoever has roles granted to roles and depending on the role and the privileges grant to the role should be limited. Limiting the accounts that have the certain roles reduces the chances that an attacker can exploit these capabilities.
## Audit
Execute the following SQL statement to audit this setting:
```sql
select role, can_login, member_of from system_auth.roles;
```
Looking for `can_login` which tells you that role can log into cassandra and `member_of` is when roles are granted to roles.
## Remediation
Looking at those users from the query that have member_of that is NOT null, decide if that user truly needs that role, if not, for each user, issue the following SQL statement (replace `<is_member>` with the value of member_of returned by the query in the audit procedure)
```sql
revoke <is_member> from role;
```
## Default Value
N/A
## References
N/A
## CIS Controls
- **v8 6.8** Define and Maintain Role-Based Access Control
- Define and maintain role-based access control, through determining and documenting the access rights necessary for each role within the enterprise to successfully carry out its assigned duties. Perform access control reviews of enterprise assets to validate that all privileges are authorized, on a recurring schedule at a minimum annually, or more frequently.
## Profile
- Level 1 - Cassandra | Manual
- Level 1 - Cassandra on Linux | Manual
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