You can activate Federal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) for VMware Aria Operations to make your environment FIPS compliant and you can also activate firewall hardening.

Activate FIPS

You can activate FIPS in the VMware Aria Operations cluster at the time of installation or after VMware Aria Operations is up and running. Adding FIPS at installation is less intrusive because the cluster has not yet started.

If the cluster is running, to activate FIPS, you must take the cluster offline. For more information, see VMware Aria Operations Cluster Management.

FIPS mode is supported in Cloud Proxy. You can continue using your cloud proxy after enabling FIPS for the VMware Aria Operations cluster.

  1. In a Web browser, navigate to the master node administration interface. https://master-node-name-or-ip-address/admin.
  2. Enter the VMware Aria Operations administrator username of admin.
  3. Enter the VMware Aria Operations administrator password and click Log In.
  4. Click Administrator Settings.
    Note: The Activate FIPS button is deactivated when the cluster is running.
  5. Click Activate FIPS after you take your cluster offline.
    Note: Once you activate FIPS, you cannot deactivate the FIPS mode in the current setup. To revert to a FIPS deactivated setup, you must re-deploy VMware Aria Operations.
  6. In the Are you sure you want to activate FIPS dialog box, read the note and provide your consent for enabling FIPS and then click Yes.
    Note: Once you activate FIPS, the cluster restarts and is not be available during this time. The cluster nodes are rebooted and once the cluster is online, all the nodes are FIPS activated.

Activate Firewall Hardening

Activating firewall hardening restricts network access to internal services in VMware Aria Operations.

  1. In a Web browser, navigate to the master node administration interface. https://master-node-name-or-ip-address/admin.
  2. Enter the VMware Aria Operations administrator username of admin.
  3. Enter the VMware Aria Operations administrator password and click Log In.
  4. Click Administrator Settings, and then click Security Settings from the Administrator Settings page.
  5. Click Activate Firewall Hardening.