EvidenceSheet
NIST SP 800-53 Rev 5 · SA - System and Services Acquisition

SA-4(6) Acquisition Process | Use of Information Assurance Products

(a) Employ only government off-the-shelf or commercial off-the-shelf information assurance and information assurance-enabled information technology products that compose an NSA-approved solution to protect classified information when the networks used to transmit the information are at a lower classification level than the information being transmitted; and (b) Ensure that these products have been evaluated and/or validated by NSA or in accordance with NSA-approved procedures.

Source: NIST SP 800-53 Rev 5, SA-4(6). 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 NIST SP 800-53 Rev 5 in the compliance library.

Base controls and their enhancements. Which apply follows the baseline you are assessed against (for example FedRAMP Moderate or High, or the low, moderate and high baselines of SP 800-53B). Text in square brackets is a parameter your organisation sets.

10
artefacts
1
held by a system
1
at each review
hard
to go live
Document repository
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

  • Security configurations to be implemented by the developer of the system, system component, or system service · Cloud console / configuration management

periodic reviewEvidence produced at each review

  • Test of Organizational processes for selecting and employing evaluated and/or validated information assurance products and services that compose an NSA-approved solution to protect classified information · Document repository

governing documentDocuments that govern the control

  • Supply chain risk management plan · Policy repository / GRC workspace
  • System and services acquisition policy · Policy repository / GRC workspace
  • Procedures addressing the integration of security requirements, descriptions, and criteria into the acquisition process · Policy repository / GRC workspace
  • Solicitation documents · Document repository
  • Acquisition documentation · Document repository
  • Acquisition contracts for the system, system component, or system service · Vendor register / contract repository
  • Service level agreements · Vendor register / contract repository
  • List of deployed IT products/solutions · Document repository

First move

Mostly documents and reviews. Pull the 1 system-held artefact from your Cloud console / configuration management on a schedule; put the documents under version control with an owner and review date, and log each review as a dated record with a named reviewer.

Common gaps auditors find

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.

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SA-4(5) Acquisition Process | System, Component, and Service Configurations · SA-4(7) Acquisition Process | NIAP-approved Protection Profiles