What evidence do auditors commonly ask for on AIS-03 Application Security Metrics?

Application security metrics catalogue with definitions, owners and targets; Dashboard or periodic report showing metric values over time (for example open vulnerabilities by severity, mean time to fix); Mapping of each metric to a business objective or compliance obligation; Management review minutes discussing metric results and actions.

What is the most common gap auditors find on AIS-03?

Metrics collected but never reported or acted on

CSA CCM v4.1 · AIS - Application & Interface Security

`AIS-03` Application Security Metrics

Technical and operational metrics are defined and put to use, in line with what the business is trying to achieve, its security requirements and the compliance duties it carries.

Source: CSA CCM v4.1, AIS-03. The statement above is our statement of the clause, read from the published text and cited so you can check it against the official text, not the instrument verbatim. Open CSA CCM v4.1 in the compliance library.

Version 4.1 adds 11 controls (among them API security, log sanitisation and a service bill of materials) and renumbers several domains. CSA accepts v4.0.x during its transition; if your STAR assessment is still on v4.0.1, check the numbering against it.

artefacts

held by a system

at each review

hard

to go live

Policy repository / GRC workspace

where the evidence lives

teal = a system already holds it · olive = produced at each review. To go live: easy when half or more of the artefacts are already held by a system, moderate from a quarter to a half, hard below a quarter.

These are the artefacts auditors commonly ask for on this requirement, our guidance rather than text from the standard. Your assessor decides what is sufficient in your context, and asks for samples across the period when a report covers one.

system holds itEvidence a system already holds

none for this control

periodic reviewEvidence produced at each review

Dashboard or periodic report showing metric values over time (for example open vulnerabilities by severity, mean time to fix) · Vulnerability scanner / patch tooling
Management review minutes discussing metric results and actions · Policy repository / GRC workspace

governing documentDocuments that govern the control

Application security metrics catalogue with definitions, owners and targets · Policy repository / GRC workspace
Mapping of each metric to a business objective or compliance obligation · Policy repository / GRC workspace

First move

No system holds this evidence for you: it is people and documents. Reminders and routing to the owner still save time. Put the document under version control with an owner and review date, and log each review as a record with reviewer and date.

Common gaps auditors find

Metrics collected but never reported or acted on
Metrics measure activity volume only, with no link to security outcomes
No target or threshold defined for any metric

Do this for your whole sheet

Paste the rows you run your controls from and get this mapping for every control at once, with the periodic-review ones flagged and a first move per row. No account for the first run.

Build my evidence sheet

AIS-02 Application Security Baseline Requirements · AIS-04 Secure Application Development Lifecycle