What evidence do auditors commonly ask for on SI-5 Security Alerts, Advisories, and Directives?

System and information integrity policy; System and information integrity procedures; Procedures addressing security alerts, advisories, and directives; Records of security alerts and advisories; System security plan; Test of Organizational processes for defining, receiving, generating, disseminating, and complying with security alerts, advisories, and directives; mechanisms supporting and/or implementing the definition, receipt, generation, and dissemination of security alerts, advisories, and directives; mechanisms sup.

What is the most common gap auditors find on SI-5?

Security directives received are not tracked to implementation within established time frames, and noncompliance is not reported back

NIST SP 800-53 Rev 5 · SI - System and Information Integrity

`SI-5` Security Alerts, Advisories, and Directives

a. Receive system security alerts, advisories, and directives from organization-defined external organizations on an ongoing basis; b. Generate internal security alerts, advisories, and directives as deemed necessary; c. Disseminate security alerts, advisories, and directives to: Selection (one or more): [organization-defined personnel or roles; organization-defined elements within the organization; organization-defined external organizations]; and d. Implement security directives in accordance with established time frames, or notify the issuing organization of the degree of noncompliance.

Source: NIST SP 800-53 Rev 5, SI-5. 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.

artefacts

held by a system

at each review

moderate

to go live

SIEM / log platform

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

Procedures addressing security alerts, advisories, and directives · SIEM / log platform
Records of security alerts and advisories · SIEM / log platform

periodic reviewEvidence produced at each review

Test of Organizational processes for defining, receiving, generating, disseminating, and complying with security alerts, advisories, and directives; mechanisms supporting and/or implementing the definition, receipt, generation, and dissemination of security alerts, advisories, and directives; mechanisms sup · SIEM / log platform

governing documentDocuments that govern the control

System and information integrity policy · Policy repository / GRC workspace
System and information integrity procedures · Policy repository / GRC workspace
System security plan · Policy repository / GRC workspace

First move

Start with the 2 of 6 artefacts that already live in a system (SIEM / log platform); keep the periodic reviews but log each one as a dated record with a named reviewer.

Common gaps auditors find

Security directives received are not tracked to implementation within established time frames, and noncompliance is not reported back
Organization never defined which external sources it must receive security alerts and advisories from

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

SI-4(25) System Monitoring | Optimize Network Traffic Analysis · SI-5(1) Security Alerts, Advisories, and Directives | Automated Alerts and Advisories