CHAPTER 5Risk Response and MitigationIn this chapter, you will.docx

CHAPTER 5
Risk Response and Mitigation
In this chapter, you will:
• Learn about the risk response process
• Understand risk response options and how to align choices
with business objectives
• Become familiar with risk response standards and frameworks
• Understand how risk appetite and tolerance affect risk
response choices
• Understand risk response action plans and how they are
developed
• Understand how controls are designed, implemented, and
executed
• Develop better project management skills to more effectively
execute risk response plans
• Learn methods to document and assess risk responses
• Determine how to best train personnel on risk responses
In this chapter, we will review the concepts that comprise
Certified in Risk and Information Systems Control (CRISC)
Domain 3, which is focused on risk response and mitigation.
There is a natural progression from the risk assessment
discussions in previous chapters that covered CRISC Domains 1
and 2, to the discussion on risk response in this chapter; you
will see that many of the outputs from those processes lead
directly to this chapter because an organization generally wants
a positive response to any risk assessment findings. After
discussing how risk responses are chosen, we will discuss how
to implement those risk responses, including how to design,
develop, and adjust controls.
The CRISC exam objectives covered during this chapter include
the following task statements:
• 3.1 Consult with risk owners to select and align recommended
risk responses with business objectives and enable informed
risk decisions

• 3.2 Consult with, or assist, risk owners on the development of
risk action plans to ensure that the plans include key elements
(e.g., response, cost, target date)
• 3.3 Consult on the design and implementation or adjustment
of mitigating controls to ensure that the risk is managed to an
acceptable level
• 3.4 Ensure that control ownership is assigned to establish
clear lines of accountability
• 3.5 Assist control owners in developing control procedures
and documentation to enable efficient and effective control
execution
• 3.6 Update the risk register to reflect changes in risk and
management’s risk response
• 3.7 Validate that risk responses have been executed according
to the risk action plans
Risk Response
Every organization has risk. The leaders of smart organizations,
however, have determined how they will deal with that risk
appropriately for their business context. Will they accept all
risks? Will they transfer some risks to a third party, such as an
insurance company? These are some questions that need to be
considered within the risk response process, discussed in this
chapter.
We will also discuss the major risk frameworks within the field
and how they incorporate risk response determination and
implementation. Please note that risk is different for every
organization; risk within an educational context is different
from a financial context, which is different from a government
context. Also keep in mind that IT risks are different from
business or mission-oriented risks. It’s important to note that
the mission of the organization helps to shape risks and
responses as well. This is why it’s so important that
organizations conduct a thorough risk analysis and understand
and prioritize the response options that are right for them. You
should also remember that the risks to the business, the business
goals and objectives, and the systems supporting those functions

should all be considered throughout the risk response process.
It’s easy as an IT professional to forget that the business
objectives are the top priority, but to maximize efficiency and
effectiveness (and especially to pass the exam), you should keep
that in mind.
It’s a good idea to think about this risk response action plan in a
Plan-Do-Check-Adjust (PDCA) life cycle, as shown in
Figure 5-1. The PDCA model (often referred to as the
Plan-Do-Check-Act or Deming cycle) promotes continuous
improvement. In this case, you are planning (designing), doing
(implementing), checking (assessing), and adjusting (adjusting
and creating documentation) the quality controls that will
respond to risk.
Figure 5-1 Plan-Do-Check-Adjust cycle
Risk Response Standards and Frameworks
Standards and frameworks help provide a standardized,
industry-accepted approach toward managing risk. While
they’re certainly not perfect, they provide a baseline for an
organization to recognize the key steps toward understanding
and categorizing the risks to their business, implementing the
appropriate security controls to lower risk to an acceptable
level, and continually monitoring the residual risk and report
status to the management. Each standard and framework has its
own pluses and minuses, and we will discuss three of the most
commonly used: the National Institute of Standards and
Technology (NIST) Risk Management Framework, the ISACA
Risk IT Framework, and the ISACA Control Objectives for
Information and Related Technology (COBIT). Keep in mind
that while we discussed these three frameworks in
Chapter 1, our discussion there served only to introduce
you to the frameworks. In this chapter, you will look at them
from the perspective of risk response in particular.

NOTE You can find more general information on standards,
frameworks, and best practices (and the differences between the
three) in
Chapter 1.
NIST Risk Management Framework
NIST Special Publication 800-37, revision 1, “Guide for
Applying the Risk Management Framework to Federal
Information Systems,” along with other supporting publications
from NIST (part of the U.S. Department of Commerce), makes
up the defining volumes of the Risk Management Framework
(RMF). The RMF is comprised of six steps, as shown in
Figure 5-2.
Figure 5-2 The NIST Risk Management Framework (courtesy
of NIST, from Special Publication 800-53, revision 4)
1. Categorize information systems.
2. Select security controls.
3. Implement security controls.
4. Assess security controls.
5. Authorize information systems.
6. Monitor security controls.
Security categorization requires the information systems and
associated information to be categorized based on an impact
analysis. When selecting a set of security controls, the security
categorization, as well as any previous assessments of risk,
must be taken into account. Following this step, you implement

the security controls that were previously selected and then
assess their effectiveness and the overall success of the controls
of lowering the risk to the accepted level. Finally, the security
controls need to be continually monitored to be sure they
continue to operate as intended, as well as considering any
changes that come into effect across the organization (think
location, mission, security classification, or other underlying
factors).
You will notice many additional concepts within NIST Special
Publication 800-37 that are germane to the CRISC exam; for
example, the first two steps of the RMF discuss categorizing
and selecting appropriate security controls (which we will
discuss later in this chapter), while steps 3, 4, and 6 map
cleanly to the implementation, assessment, and continuous
monitoring of controls (covered throughout this book). For
these reasons alone, it’s a great idea to read this document to
understand how the steps work together and how they are
similar to (and sometimes different from) other frameworks.
From a response perspective, the key point that you need to
understand about the NIST RMF, and what makes it so
revolutionary within the Department of Defense (DoD) and
associated organizations, is that risk response starts with steps 4
and 5 of the RMF. This is where authorizing the system (based
upon the responsible authority’s acceptance of risk levels) and
continuous monitoring take place. Continuous monitoring
within the RMF context means near-real-time risk management
through the implementation of a comprehensive set of controls
that provide an up-to-date status of the current security posture
of the organization. To achieve these ends, the RMF encourages
automated mechanisms (such as Tenable Security Center and the
McAfee Host-Based Security System, for example) to be
implemented to support rapid analysis and reporting to
management, and for organizations under the mandate of the
standard, the RMF establishes a level of accountability and
responsibility for the controls selected and implemented within
supporting information systems.

Risk response is also covered in NIST Special Publication 800-
39, “Managing Information Security Risk,” and the different
response options are discussed in
Chapter 3 of that publication. They include risk
acceptance, transfer, avoidance, sharing, and so forth, which
make it a great reference document. They are similar to what
the next framework, the ISACA Risk IT Framework, discusses
in terms of risk response. We’ll discuss the risk response
options in more depth later in this chapter.
ISACA Risk IT Framework
Published in 2009, the ISACA Risk IT Framework is another
common risk management framework that you should be aware
of. ISACA looked to create a framework that merges the
traditional IT models with a more risk-focused mind-set. Within
the ISACA model, the activities considered key are grouped into
processes, which are grouped into three domains, as described
in
Table 5-1.
Table 5-1 Domains and Associated Processes Within the
ISACA Risk IT Framework
There are three main domains to consider within the ISACA
Risk IT Framework: Risk Governance, Risk Evaluation, and
Risk Response. You will see many of the same concepts that
you’ll find within this book (and even this chapter), so it’s
definitely a worthwhile model to review. The Risk Governance
domain discusses risk appetite, risk tolerance, and
communicating risk to leadership (this should sound familiar!).
The Risk Evaluation domain includes an understanding of the
impacts to the business and the risk scenarios, developed
through the inclusion of internal and external environmental
factors, risk management capability, IT capability, and IT-
related business capability.

Since we’ve already given you a general overview of the other
domains of this framework in
Chapter 1, we’ll focus on risk response in particular
here. The Risk Response domain covers the risk response
definition, risk response prioritization, and key risk indicators
(KRIs). KRIs are those that show a potential for risk that is
beyond the organization’s risk appetite level, and we will cover
them in much more depth in
Chapter 6. The framework also describes risk response
options such as risk avoidance, risk mitigation, risk sharing and
transfer, and risk acceptance. If these sound familiar to you,
they are the same options described in NIST, as we mentioned
earlier. Again, we’ll go into depth on them later in the chapter.
TIP Understand the relationships between the Risk
Governance, Risk Evaluation, and Risk Response domains; even
though the Risk IT Framework is not covered on the CRISC
exam, the framework provides a useful foundation of the
concepts.
You’ll see many areas of similarity between the ISACA Risk IT
Framework and the CRISC exam, so it definitely wouldn’t hurt
to include it in your study plan.
COBIT
While ISACA’s COBIT doesn’t focus solely on risk, it’s still
important for you to have a cursory understanding of the
framework and its supporting processes, inputs and outputs, and
activities. Again, ISACA authored both the CRISC and COBIT
frameworks, so you will see many of the same concepts
interwoven across the two (as well as within the Risk IT
Framework discussed previously, which is quite complementary
and often grouped with the other two).
To refresh your memory, COBIT was designed to help
businesses take advantage of IT assets, increase compliance
levels, and manage risk through an integrated framework. This

framework includes processes that have general inputs and
outputs, objectives and activities, and associated measures. The
most recent version, COBIT 5, was released in 2012, with two
updates published in late 2012 and 2013, respectively covering
information security and assurance. This should tip you off to
the fact that while many IT professionals are familiar with the
COBIT framework, it is not meant to be IT-centric or IT
security–centric and was developed with organizational
governance in mind as its primary goal. Within COBIT, the
activities considered key are grouped into domains, which are
broken down into processes, as described in
Table 5-2.
Table 5-2 Domains and Associated Processes Within the
ISACA COBIT Framework
The COBIT processes associated with risk response are Monitor
and Evaluate and are used to ensure that risk response options
are implemented and are consistent with the organization’s
desired strategy for dealing with risk. Remember that with
COBIT, we are talking governance, so this supports the
governance perspective more so than an IT risk perspective.
These processes could be used to fulfill governance and
regulatory requirements with regard to risk response.
Understanding Risk Response Options
Having developed your understanding of risk, you should also
develop an understanding of the corresponding risk response
options. These options will help you bring your risk levels down
to that vaunted level of risk tolerance that your organization can
accept. Within this section, consider how you would recommend
that your organization respond to risk effectively but with a
balanced approach.
Evaluating Risk Response Options
Avoidance, mitigation, sharing, and acceptance are all valid
options that you should consider using (sometimes at the same

time) to lower the risk level you face. The key is to use these
options together; you want to balance risk and reward to
maximize the benefits. These benefits can be financial or some
other, perhaps difficult to quantify (for example, morale,
partnerships, long-term strategy), benefit. We’ll discuss the
different risk response options in the next few sections.
Risk Mitigation
Risk mitigation generally involves the application of controls
that lower the overall level of risk by reducing the
vulnerability, likelihood of the threat exploit, or impact to the
asset if the risk were to be realized. Mitigation actions come in
a number of forms; a policy requiring nightly off-site backups
of critical data can mitigate the risk of data loss, for instance.
Similarly, applying a newly released web browser patch can
mitigate the risk of exploitation. The goal is to get the risk
down to a level considered acceptable by the organization’s
leadership. For the CRISC exam, you need to understand four
main types of controls: managerial, technical, operational, and
preparedness. The following are examples of each.
Managerial
• Requiring an acceptable use policy to dictate IT usage within
the organization
• Starting a risk management program to identify, lower, and
monitor unacceptable risk levels within the organization
Technical
• Implementing additional firewalls to protect internal (non-
public-facing) systems
• Adding 802.1X port-based network access control to deter
unapproved assets being added to the network
• Installing an intrusion detection system/intrusion prevention
system (IDS/IPS) to monitor for malicious activities or
violations of policy
Operational
• Implementing delegation/separation of duties procedures to
assure that one person does not have the sole control over key
duties

• Mandating security training and certification requirements to
increase the baseline knowledge of IT security-related issues
and concepts
Preparedness
• Executing a tabletop exercise of the Continuity of Operations
Plan to test its effectiveness and identify gaps that should be
addressed
TIP Remember that you’re looking for low-cost, high-reward
solutions to offset risk. Sometimes this is just a plan you
implement or a process improvement, rather than an expensive
piece of hardware!
Risk Sharing
Risk sharing (often referred to as
risk transference) entails the use of a third party to
offset part of the risk. Risk sharing can involve the outsourcing
of some activities to a third party to reduce the financial
impacts of a risk event in many cases. Sharing off-site (co-
location) assets and contractual obligations with other entities is
one way that organizations implement risk sharing; a cloud
service provider can be used within this scenario. The cloud
provider might be contractually obligated to assume part of the
financial impact in the event of a breach, but be aware that there
is a potential loss of brand goodwill or other intangible assets
that can be difficult to offload. Another example of risk sharing
is the use of an insurance service to cover the financial impacts
(at least partially) of a breach; however, the intangible losses
mentioned previously would still be present.
EXAM TIP Don’t forget that use of a risk-sharing scheme
does not totally absolve an organization of its responsibilities;
there may still be legal liabilities involved.
Risk Acceptance

There will always be some level of residual risk, no matter how
many controls you implement or the amount of insurance you
purchase. Again, the goal is to get the risk down to a level
considered acceptable by the leadership. Risk acceptance occurs
when the active decision is made to assume the risk (either
inherent or residual) and take no further action to reduce it. The
word
active is critical here; risk acceptance is different from
being risk ignorant in that the risk is identified, alternatives are
considered, and a conscious decision is made to accept it. A
good example of this is when a person intentionally drives alone
in the carpool lane during the hours where multiple people are
required to be in the vehicle; if that person is pulled over and
ticketed for their lawlessness, that would incur a financial
impact. However, they knowingly took the risk of this action,
understanding the consequences if caught and accepting it
anyway. Similarly, a company might choose to willfully ignore
government-mandated control implementation that would incur
fines or other financial penalties, assuming that the financial
cost incurred would be less than the controls would be to
implement. Another common situation is an organization
choosing to work in a developing country, knowing there is a
high level of risk; the financial rewards of being adopted early
could outweigh any potential losses.
EXAM TIP It’s important to note that risk acceptance doesn’t
insinuate ignorance; it’s an active acknowledgment and
conscious decision to accept risk as it is.
Risk Avoidance
Risk can be avoided through a number of methods. Can you
remove the source of risk by making a different choice? Perhaps
you don’t need to conduct the activity at all. Avoiding risk can
mean anything from eliminating risk associated with a
particular activity through the careful analysis of risks and

subsequent changes to a plan to the complete avoidance of a
risk by not performing a planned activity. Risk avoidance is the
option taken when, after controls have been considered, the
level of risk is still not acceptable. An organization might
choose not to take on a proposed project because of the
probability of failure and subsequent loss of capital, for
example. Another scenario might be the organization choosing
to not adopt a cloud solution because of the level of sensitivity
of information that would be stored within the cloud.
Selecting Risk Response
Selecting a risk response entails more than just blind luck or
uncanny good fortune. In selecting a risk response, you should
consider all of the factors we’ve discussed previously, such as
cost (both of the response and of the potential cost of not
responding), organizational context and associated missions,
risk tolerance, and the simple ease of implementation. Within
this section we will discuss some of these considerations and
how they should affect your final decision.
Risk Response Parameters
Cost is obviously a large factor in response determination.
When you think about cost, think about not only the financial
impacts of any decision but also the less easily quantified
aspects such as loss of goodwill, loss of brand status, and other
hard-to-define attributes. You also need to consider the cost to
maintain the responsive mitigation over its required life span.
For example, if you are required to apply a costly IT solution
into your architecture to load balance and you don’t have an IT
professional who is skilled or knowledgeable in that area, you
may be required to hire a new professional or train an existing
staff member. That also brings up your ability to plan for
contingencies; is one person enough to complete this task? You
may need more personnel in general to maintain your new
security posture or to cross-train existing personnel as an
alternative to hiring new people. Maintenance is a huge
consideration that should not be shrugged off.

The ability (also defined as
capability) for the organization to implement the
response should also be considered. How mature is your
company’s ability to implement the response? Do you have a
small, untrained, ad hoc team (perhaps that sounds cynical, but
it happens)? In that case, a more sophisticated measure might
not be appropriate; perhaps you need a new team! In contrast, a
sharp, well-trained, experienced team can handle more
complicated mitigation measures and processes.
How effective will the response be?
Effectiveness can be measured as the extent to which
the response reduces the likelihood or the impact of the risk
event to the organization. If the effectiveness of the response
activity is in question, that’s a strong reason to consider that
path questionable as well. You should also consider the
efficiency of a response.
Efficiency can be described as the ability for a risk
response to cover one or more objectives that our organization
sets in front of them. Quite simply, solutions are more efficient
if they lower more risks than if they lower only one risk.
Consider low-cost, highly effective solutions your “nirvana”
and work from there. You want to obviously avoid high-cost,
ineffective solutions, but it’s shocking how often you will
encounter them!
We will talk about prioritizing risk responses in the following
section, and these concepts go hand-in-hand.
Prioritizing Risk Responses
Now that you have a better understanding of what your risk
response options are and how you will select them, you need to
understand how they should be prioritized. Have you ever
worked for a company that had too much money to spend on its
security program? (Here’s a hint … we haven’t.) It’s unlikely
that you’ll have the resources to complete all of your proposed
risk mitigation and response strategies, so knowing the proper

priority is important. This will drive how you spend the money
and apply the human resources that will lower your overall risk
to an acceptable level.
Figure 5-3 depicts the rankings of how you’d generally
prioritize risk response options, and we’ll discuss that ranking
in more depth within the next section.
Figure 5-3 Prioritizing risk response options
Risk Response Prioritization Options
There are three prioritization options that you need to be aware
of for the CRISC exam. They are
quick wins, business cases, and
deferrals. We will discuss each of these in this section
and provide examples of both the options and the alternatives.
Quick wins are actions that can be taken that really are winners;
as we discussed earlier, you are looking to select risk responses
that are high reward and low cost and that are both effective and
efficient. Quick wins are just that; they meet those criteria and
address a medium to high risk and look good doing it! You
should always be looking for a quick win to address a scenario,
though that’s easier said than done. Consider a scenario where
an organization is having difficulties maintaining source code
integrity across multiple teams of software developers. The
developers are overwriting each other’s work and causing havoc
with old or untested code being pushed into production. It’s a
nightmare but one that happens regularly! An example of a
quick win is the development of a configuration management
board that immediately begins discussing and making decisions
on source code changes and cross-pollinating projects among
teams. The team might exist happily on its own, or the team
might look at incorporating source code control software to
force a developer to “check in” and “check out” software before
it’s changed. This facilitates logging and improves the ability to

track and roll back from catastrophic implementations. A quick
win is almost obvious in nature; why wouldn’t you want to take
advantage of it?
In contrast, making a business case is more difficult than
pitching a quick win. A business case for a particular risk
response must be made if the response can’t be quickly or easily
implemented without a significant cost or change to the
organization or the system. These changes might include
processes, infrastructure, architecture, or design, and they are
significant enough to warrant a business case to respond to a
risk issue. A business case for a risk response justifies the
expense and work required to make the response function
properly. When you make a business case for a risk response,
you must take a number of factors into account. For example,
what projects are currently in the pipeline? Is there something
that would conflict with your proposed response option, make it
irrelevant, or make it more costly? How’s the business doing? If
the bottom line is weak, it will be harder to sell any risk
response solution that is costly, even if it would significantly
improve the baseline level of risk. When a business case needs
to be made, generally the risk response option is more costly in
general, whether it is costly in terms of financial or personnel
resources. It also might be attempting to address a low or
medium risk that doesn’t have the attention of the leadership in
the way a high risk would. Even an efficient and effective
response to a low risk must be questioned and prioritized
appropriately.
Finally, you choose to defer when risk response options simply
don’t make good business sense. A deferral is the polar opposite
of the quick win; whereas a quick win is almost obvious in its
ability to address a medium or high risk in an efficient and
effective way, a deferral is the choice when you have a high
cost of response associated with a low risk, one where even a
business case can’t be made. In the scheme of prioritization,
deferrals will be at the bottom of the list. We choose to accept
risk, perhaps until the cost is reduced, or choose risk acceptance

as our permanent measure.
At the end of the day, your prioritization should take into
account a number of concerns. These include the regulatory
mandates that are applicable to your organization, the impact to
the business through implementation of the proposed measure
(including costs both financial and nonfinancial), the market
conditions you find yourself in, the culture and the climate of
the organization (including the inherent resistance to change),
and the ability to optimize resources.
EXAM TIP Always remember that low-cost responses to high-
risk scenarios are the goal of risk response prioritization.
Identifying Business Opportunities
Businesses of all types and markets are looking to create
business opportunities. With opportunities, however, comes
risk. Risk is not always a bad thing; in some cases, it allows
you to get out ahead of your competitors and capitalize on
forward-thinking ideas that may be out of your comfort zone.
An example that we’ll use frequently is a business looking to
move into a developing country; the risk is high, but the reward
could also be great. We’ll identify these opportunities here and
explore how they can be leveraged.
Identifying business opportunities during the selection of risk
responses requires the organization to understand its risk
appetite and risk tolerance. As we discussed in
Chapter 1, risk appetite is how much risk an
organization is willing to deal with in any given endeavor,
while risk tolerance is the acceptable level of deviation in risk
for a particular endeavor or business pursuit. Remember, there’s
a certain amount of risk in every business enterprise or pursuit,
but the organization may not be able or willing to tolerate large
deviations from what it considers its acceptable level of risk on
an endeavor. The selection of risk responses will inevitably
change the risk appetite/risk tolerance calculation within the
organization, and any risk response should be examined against

these guiding factors.
When the organization is able and willing to take a risk, it can
be considered a business opportunity, and to identify those
opportunities, you need to understand the areas that can
withstand the risks. Cloud computing is a great example of an
opportunity that many organizations consider worth the risk
based on the rewards; operating within a difficult business area
such as a developing country is another we discussed
previously. In the end, to identify business opportunities,
remember to look for areas of opportunities that can be
leveraged through the creation of a competitive advantage or
increased synthesis of activities and processes.
Risk Mitigation
Hooray! You’ve selected your risk responses carefully and
prioritized them appropriately. You’re feeling good about how
you’re going to positively capitalize on good risk and minimize
bad risk, and you’re going to do it efficiently and effectively.
You’re a risk response rock star! Alas, now comes another
challenge: implementing those risk response options. In this
section, we will talk a bit about how controls are implemented,
as well as the concepts of exception management and residual
risk. Even the best-laid risk response plan will need to account
for these concepts.
Have you ever seen a manager act with a knee-jerk reaction to a
sudden problem that ends up costing more time and money
implementing a solution than the actual issue itself would have?
Implementing risk responses properly should consider a few key
components, such as the ability to measure its success, proper
documentation, and appropriate training.
Earlier, we discussed a number of different risk response
options, such as risk avoidance, risk sharing (or transference),
and risk acceptance. In this chapter, we will focus on risk
mitigation. Risk mitigation incorporates
controls of varying types across an enterprise to lower
risks to an appropriate level. These controls can be anything

from a written document to a sophisticated, comprehensive
technical solution, but they should all be designed to most
effectively and efficiently mitigate the risk they are associated
with. At the end of the day, control should provide the
organization with some level of assurance that they can meet
their business objectives and deal with any events that occur in
a manner that is acceptable to the leadership of the
organization.
Risk Response Action Plans
Quite simply, the risk response action plan lists the risk
responses that have been chosen and charts their progress and
associated timeline, with an appropriate action owner. This
ownership piece is critical because you need a “belly button” to
push if things are not going as quickly or as smoothly as they
should be. Without a proper risk response action plan, you will
likely end up losing sight of where your risk responses are in
their progress, if they’ve made any progress at all. Risk
response action plans can contain any number of data points
inside of them, but at a minimum, they should list the
prioritized risk responses, their associated costs, a timeline for
their implementation, the associated cost, and the owner of the
risk response. The plan should be formally accepted by senior
leadership, monitored continuously, and reviewed at regular
intervals to ensure it does not deviate from a risk or response
perspective. Any deviation should be reported immediately to
the senior leadership.
Control Development
So, what is a control anyway? Quite simply, a control is some
sort of measure, be it a document, a technical solution, a
procedure, or some other remediation that is put into place to
improve the overall security posture of your organization
through correcting a gap or making up for a shortfall in another
control. Controls can be technical solutions, such as firewalls or
intrusion detection systems, but they can also be processes,
procedures, policies, or physical controls. We talked in

Chapter 1 about the types of controls
(administrative/managerial, technical/logical, and
physical/operational), but controls also can be grouped in
different families: access control, auditing, configuration
management, contingency planning, personnel security, and so
on. So, how do you determine new controls to apply to your
system or whether your existing controls are good enough? We
will discuss this in more depth in the following sections.
Control Types
As you may have gathered by now, there are many types of
controls to choose from. However, you can generally group
these controls into a number of broad categories by their
intended function; the most common are compensating,
corrective, detective, deterrent, directive, and preventative. You
may notice some significant overlap between these categories,
and that is why some experts do not distinguish between, for
example, deterrent controls and preventative controls.
Table 5-3 lists each control type, its definition, and an
example control.
Table 5-3 Controls Categorized by Function
NIST 800-53
NIST Special Publication 800-53, “Security and Privacy
Controls for Federal Information Systems and Organizations,” is
a key catalog of controls to be aware of if you are doing
business in the U.S. government but is also a great resource
even if you’re not. With its latest revision (revision 4, as of this
writing), it includes controls for assuring privacy as well as
security and is meant to be policy and technology neutral,
meaning that the controls are broad enough to be applied to any
architecture. If you’re looking for a document to tell you the
steps of how to configure your router securely, this isn’t the
document for you; it’s perfect, though, if you’re looking for a

comprehensive view of the scope and magnitude of a system-
level control solution.
Figure 5-4 lists the families of security controls and
their unique identifiers from NIST 800-53.
Figure 5-4 NIST 800-53 security controls identifiers and
family names (courtesy of NIST, from Special Publication 800-
53, revision 4)
ISO 27002
While NIST 800-53 is used heavily within the U.S. government,
International Standards Organization (ISO) 27002 is used much
more widely internationally. Much like 800-53, 27002 groups
controls into families, such as the following:
• Human resource security
• Asset management
• Access control
• Cryptography
• Physical and environmental security
• Operation security
• Communication security
• System acquisition, development, and maintenance
• Supplier relationships
• Incident management
• Business continuity management
Since its birth, versions of 27002 specific to different
industries, such as healthcare, have been developed that are
tailored to their specific contexts, laws, and regulations.
Designing Effective Controls
The first step in designing an effective control is to determine
who exactly owns the control; this is key because it will
determine who actually designs the control, who tracks its care
and feeding, and who creates the documentation that will follow
the control well into its implementation and eventual
disposition. This individual or group should be the party

responsible for determining the security categorization (SC) of
the system or environment into which the control will be
applied. NIST 800-53 recommends the determination of the SC
of an information system as an equation, as described here:
SC = {(confidentiality, impact), (integrity, impact),
(availability, impact)}, where the acceptable values for
potential impact are low, moderate, or high
Using this equation, a low-impact system would need to have
most or all the confidentiality, integrity, and availability (CIA)
elements with a low impact; a moderate-impact system would
have a mixture of low and moderate and potentially high
elements; and a high-impact system would have most or all of
the CIA elements with a high impact. Note that higher-impact
systems will usually have more controls applied to them,
reflecting their higher sensitivity and criticality within the
organization, and these controls will normally be applied with a
higher degree of effort or rigor. It is important to understand the
SC because it will help you determine how much money, time,
and other resources you want to devote to any particular
control. As discussed earlier, you are looking for low -risk,
high-reward controls. Understanding the impact of the system
allows you to plan and design more cost-effective controls.
After determining your security category, you will want to
understand the
common controls. These are controls that are common
across your organization and are shared between more than one
information system. For example, you may have more than one
information system being housed within the same server room
in your headquarters building. Perhaps a previously accredited
system review already ensured that you have a strong lock and a
heavy door between those servers and the rest of the world. This
would be a common control between the old system and your
new system. Other possibilities could be continuity of
operations, policies, and procedures; guards at entrances;
biometrics; and so on. These should have already been
documented in a plan (we hope!), so a great place to start is to

review the security plans for other systems within your
organization. Don’t forget the advent of the cloud has created
situations where you are sharing data and systems among more
than one organization, often supported by another third-party
organization, so you may have common controls among all of
your organizations that need to be considered. Also, be
constantly aware that any common controls that do not meet
your specific requirements (let’s say there’s a strong door but
no lock) will require you to add a compensating control to meet
your standards.
Selecting the appropriate controls for you and developing them
often depend on your context (for example, governmen t,
healthcare, banking, or some other specific context that
mandates a certain regulatory or legal standard for your
security). Further, you already developed your security
category, as discussed earlier, so you know the impact of the
system if it was lost for a period of time. After determining the
common controls, you now know where the gaps between the
two points are. Now is the time to begin documenting those
gaps in the risk response action plan. Don’t forget, if you are
dealing with a third party or cloud-based provider, you should
also be considering any service level agreements or other legal
documentation that will need to be drawn up as part of your risk
response action plan.
Control Implementation and Adjustment
Now that you’ve selected the appropriate controls for your
system, it’s time to implement them. You have unlimited time,
money, and personnel available, so this shouldn’t be an issue,
right? In a perfect world, that would be the case; however, we
all know that we have to deal with constraints on a daily basis,
so we will discuss how to deal with control implementation as a
project using project management tools later in this chapter.
This is a great time also to consider any current or future
technology knowledge that you may want in your organization.
Are the areas you are applying controls to grossly out of date?

Or are they stable and still widely used, causing your leadership
to have an “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” approach to phasing
them out? Consider how you could enable change in the
organization through implementing new technologies. This
could be anything from upgrading your core network
infrastructure to implementing biometrics at critical entry
points.
Don’t forget to do a thorough review of your existing controls
that are in place and how they may need to be adjusted. This
will need to be factored into your project plan, both for time
and for resources.
Risk Response Assessment
Security controls should be tested before the system is
authorized or credited and at irregular intervals afterward. You
assess a program or a project to determine whether it is
meeting your specified objectives and to determine whether the
controls you have selected to protect the system are performing
their desired function to the level you need them to. Conducting
an assessment early in the life cycle of control implementation
allows for issues with the control to be determined and
remediated as appropriate. Based on the rules and regulations
that your organization must adhere to, you may be able to do an
internal audit of your controls, or you may be required to use a
third-party agency or other testing authority. Either way, be
mindful that an assessment should be thorough, technical (as
appropriate), and independent. Anyone conducting an
assessment should be impartial, as free of bias as possible, and
preferably not in the same part of the organization as the
personnel charged with implementing the controls. You will
often see two types of testing discussed within the community;
developmental testing/evaluation is conducted in parallel with
the development of a system (or in this case the controls for the
system), and operational testing/evaluation is conducted before
the system is released into final production (or operation).
While both types of testing are required in some segments (such
as major government systems), some organizations that do not

require developmental testing and evaluation fail to get elected,
to their own peril. Quite simply, the time and money spent to
assess iteratively along the life cycle of the project will save
you dividends in the end. Just imagine the headache you will
have if you find out that a major control you were betting on to
reduce the risk of external breaches does not play well with
your network infrastructure. You would have found that out
much earlier if testing occurred sooner. Either way, you should
have an assessor, inspector, agent, or other authority assigned to
assess your system to detail any flaws found and allow you to
better fill the gaps.
So, what exactly occurs during control assessment? If you are
using a formal set of controls, such as the NIST framework
discussed throughout this chapter, you can expect each family
of controls to be decomposed into specific requirements that can
be assessed in a variety of ways. For example, if continuity of
operations is one of the controls you have implemented, you
could expect a review of your continuity of operations
documentation, a visit to your off-site facility (as appropriate),
and perhaps even a test of your backup solution. Another
example is the door and lock combination that we discussed
previously in this chapter; any assessor worth his or her salt
will be checking to make sure you have a lock on all doors but
that they are also adequate to meet the requirements to lower
your organization’s risk posture. There will be a mixture of
documentation review, technical assessments, and interviews
that are conducted to determine whether you have adequately
covered all the controls required.
Table 5-4 lists some common assessment techniques. If
you’ve done your due diligence in preparing for an assessment
(through adequate documentation, thorough implementation,
and appropriate analysis of the actual controls required), this
should be no sweat. However, if formal assessment is required
for an authorization or accreditation action and you did not
diligently pursue these activities, you could be in for a major

headache when you receive your results.
Table 5-4 Control Assessment Options
Ever thorough, NIST has a guide to security assessment that
aligns well with its other documents covering risk management.
NIST Special Publication 800-115, “Technical Guide to
Information Security Testing And Assessment,” was written
with four points of focus: helping organizations establish an
information security assessment policy, implementing a
repeatable and documented assessment methodology,
determining the objectives of the security assessment, and
analyzing the findings and developing risk mitigation
techniques to address weaknesses.
An alternative to the NIST framework is the Open-Source
Security Testing Methodology Manual (OSSTMM) from the
Institute for Security and Open Methodologies (ISECOM).
Currently in its fourth revision, the goal of the OSSTMM is to
create a standard for thorough and practical security testing
across the community with the following goals:
• Quantifiable
• Consistent and repeatable
• Valid beyond the “now” timeframe
• Thorough
• Compliant to individual and local laws and the human right to
privacy
Even if you do not intend to use the OSSTMM framework, it is
a useful reference document that contains handy rules of thumb
for gauging testing time and sample rules of engagement.
Documentation
Risk response options must also be thoroughly documented,
with a clear owner defined, whether it is a new process, control,
team, policy, or any other solution. Just imagine a risk being
uncovered that requires a set of procedures for storing,
handling, and destroying sensitive information. The procedures

are developed and put on a shelf until an incident occurs. In the
meantime, the procedures go stale (locations change, for
example), and no clear owner was defined to be responsible for
maintaining the documentation. The procedures, in this event,
are as good as useless. Substitute any situation where
documentation is not only helpful but necessary, and you can
quickly see why this is so important.
By this point, you’ve no doubt made a number of changes to
your organizational security posture, and these changes should
be documented within your security plan. You should write
security plans assuming that the personnel who are currently
active within your organization could leave at any time (the old
story about someone being hit by a bus and was the only one
who knew how to perform a specific function), so it’s best to
always prepare for contingencies such as this by having your
security plan as heavily documented as possible. You need to
make sure to include a functional description of all controls that
were applied to the system, any decisions that were made
leading to these controls being implemented, any
interdependencies, and any other relevant information. Finally,
you also want to include any documentation from testing that
occurred and remediations that were made based on testing
results.
Any risk response planning should outline a rough timeline for
implementation, a rough estimate of costs, who is responsible
for the implementation, and any required tools (such as
software, hardware, and so on) required to complete the tasks.
More detail is always better! A lack of clarity is not your ally,
especially if the plan is handed over to a team that wasn’t
involved in the initial planning process.
Finally, you’ll want to track the status of your risk response
implementation. This is usually done using a risk register,
discussed previously in
Chapter 3. To recap, the risk register is a document that
tracks various elements of the identified risks, such as the risk
name, risk impact, risk probability, risk mitigation, action

owner, and action suspense date. This risk register can be used
to track the implementation of the mitigations and assure that
timelines are met.
Do you have any metrics in place that can determine the success
of the risk response? Metrics help you quantify the
effectiveness of your implemented risk response over its life.
Monitoring comes into play here because it facilitates your
ability to understand your performance against the metric.
Monitoring can be done through a tool, through a team, or
through a combination of both.
Exception Management
It’s easy to say that your risk response options should always be
implemented. You carefully considered the risks to the
organization through the risk analysis process, selected
appropriate responses, and monitored your risk levels diligently.
How could you possibly not implement a control? That would
be crazy! However, there are exceptions, and you need to have a
process in place to manage those exceptions and keep them
minimized. Consider the situation where an operating system
patch cannot be applied because of a legacy application that’s
critical to the organization’s mission. This mitigation is
important but less important than the legacy application and its
associated mission. What to do?
Exception management comes into play here; you need
to document this as an accepted exception to the policy and
track it. Perhaps the patch can be implemented in the future, or
another mitigation could come along and make the exception
moot. This is another aspect of risk acceptance; you are asking
management to accept an ongoing risk, as an exception, because
the response cannot be implemented for whatever reason. Either
way, keeping a close eye is key to not letting these exceptions
slip through the cracks.
NOTE Don’t forget to track exceptions and remove any that

aren’t valid! It’s easy to let them slip through the cracks.
Reporting the Risk Response Activities
What are the reporting requirements for your organization? Are
they bound by government regulations, international business
partnerships, or other binding agreements? Understanding what
is required of your organization is absolutely critical for your
reporting requirements. You also need to understand what you
should report in any of these contexts. For example, it is a good
idea to report any issues you have ongoing, the status of any
ongoing remediation actions, how your controls performed, any
ongoing incidents, and how your overall risk response activities
are performing, essentially the “Bottom Line, Up Front” of your
risk response action plan.
Along with understanding the underlying operational
environment, it is key to understand your stakeholders and what
their needs are. For example, your board of directors might
want a high-level, quarterly presentation on compliance levels
relative to the previously discussed operational environment, as
well as performance relative to business goals and objectives.
The risk committee, conversely, might want a much more “deep
dive” into the individual risks identified previously, the new
risks that could potentially come to the forefront, and how
different business units are supporting the risk management
program across the entire organization. It’s important that you
understand how these different stakeholders need different
reporting mechanisms and tools and that you identify clearly
(preferably in writing) how they expect you to support them
through timely and relevant reporting.
When reporting, you can include a few standard items, such as
measured control effectiveness (which can be rolled up to a
higher level, as necessary, for management), any ongoing
issues, any perceived gaps, the status of any remediation
actions, any incidents or risk events that have occurred since the
last report, and the overall trending status of the effectiveness
of the risk management process. Also, identify ahead of time

whether your report will be included as an input to a greater
enterprise report and work to include any appropriate
information needed to facilitate that enterprise-level view. This
will help garner support for the risk program supporting the
business goals and objectives.
You should review the results of any third-party analysis or
audit that has taken place and incorporate the findings into your
understanding of the organization’s risk posture. Has your
organization conducted any type of internal audit or self-
assessment? These will be important to review and to take a
look at how they affect the risk profile and where they will need
to be mapped. We’ll discuss the risk tolerance in many places
throughout this book, so suffice it to say that the risk tolerance
should be considered throughout the reporting process as a key
input.
NOTEChapter 1 has more information on the concept of risk
tolerance and how it relates to risk acceptance.
Training
After all is said and done and the controls have been
implemented and documented, it is important that you conduct
regular and traceable training that covers a number of aspects.
On top of the usual cyber security, privacy, and acceptable user
training that most organizations (should) have in place, it is
imperative that the employees responsible for the care and
feeding of your controls are properly trained on both the content
of the controls and the context of the controls. What does this
mean? Content means that a network administrator in charge of
your infrastructure, and the subsequent controls, understands
the latest evolutions and revolutions in both current threats and
vulnerabilities. Context means that the same network
administrator in a highly sensitive government environment
(think missiles, space, and so on) should know that they should
be extra prudent and consider the limitations inherent to their
systems and how they interact with other systems (if not the

larger Internet). Without both of these, content and context, as
part of the training portfolio for all personnel charged with
implementation of controls, you may well likely find that one or
the other is neglected.
System Development Life Cycle
There are many assorted control-related life cycles; some deal
with systems, and some are more specific to software or other
project types. In this section, we’ll discuss a system
development life cycle (SDLC), which is a generic framework
used within NIST 800-64, “Security Considerations in the
System Development Life Cycle.” The NIST SDLC has five
phases: initiation, acquisition/development,
implementation/assessment, operations/maintenance, and sunset
(otherwise known as disposition). Be on the lookout in this
section at how well many of these particular steps align with the
concepts covered previously. You should see how important it is
that controls are developed and implemented within each phase
of this life cycle. In fact, NIST states that “an integrated
security component (composed of milestones, deliverables,
control gates, and interdependencies) that specifically addresses
risk management…enables security to be planned, acquired,
built-in, and employed as an integral part of a project or
system.”
Figure 5-5 depicts the SDLC covered in NIST 800-64.
Figure 5-5 NIST 800-64 System Development Life Cycle
(courtesy of NIST, from Special Publication 800-64)
Initiation
In the initiation phase, the need for a system is determined, and
its purpose is documented formally. Within the initiation phase,
it is critical to consider your control development and
integration early and often. In fact, you will save yourself many
headaches, time, and eventually money by considering your
controls at every step along the way. Within the initiation

phase, security is often expressed as a business risk or a risk to
project completion or the business itself. Outputs for the
initiation phase could include the following:
• Documentation of security roles and responsibilities
• Documentation of controls required by regulation, law, or
other guidance
• Schedule of control activities or decisions throughout the
project timeline
Acquisition/Development
Within the acquisition/development phase, the risk assessment
is often conducted, along with any security testing and
development of documentation for system certification and
accreditation (as required). Risk assessment is covered in-depth
in
Chapter 2, but just note that an effective risk
assessment is built on the initiation phase having been
conducted appropriately and thoroughly. This is also the phase
where the bulk of your control development will occur.
Implementation/Assessment
Within the implementation/assessment phase, the system is
installed in its new environment and evaluated for its readiness,
both operational and security. Here you do a final certification
and accreditation review, and the authorizing official or other
accrediting authority will take responsibility for the security
posture of the system. Any documentation to connect the system
to any external entity should be completed within this phase.
Outputs for the implementation/assessment phase could include
the following:
• Accreditation package
• System authorization
• System security plan
Operations/Maintenance
Within the operations/maintenance phase of the SDLC, the
system is actively operating, so you can leave it alone here,
right? Not likely. You need to constantly be looking for ways to

improve and enhance the system, and any improvements or
enhancements need to be considered for their security
ramifications. Furthermore, the system must be assessed
periodically based on regulatory, legal, or other guidelines to
ensure that it continues to maintain a risk level that aligns with
the company’s risk tolerance. Outputs for the
operations/maintenance phase could include the following:
• Updated plans of actions and milestones
• Change control board documentation
• Renewed accreditation and authorization documentation
Sunset (Disposition)
Every good thing must come to an end, and systems are no
exception. The final phase of the SDLC requires a system to be
disposed of properly, and in doing this you need to be aware of
the controls required for securely disposing of a system and any
corresponding data or other artifacts. As NIST points out, there
is usually not a definitive end to a system; it is often merely
rolled into the next generation of systems, and any data and
associated requirements become the province of that group of
personnel tasked with the care and feeding of the new shiny
solution. However, you do need to be aware that, if required, it
is important to have an orderly and safe disposal process on
hand that includes migration of data or archival solutions as
appropriate. Outputs for the implementation/assessment phase
could include the following:
• Logs of hardware and media sanitization/destruction
• Transition plan
Project Management
Risk responses should be implemented in a controlled, defined,
and monitored manner as discussed previously. One tried-and-
true way to do this is through the tenets of project management.
The Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK), a
publication of the Project Management Institute, defines a
project as “a temporary endeavor to create a unique product,
service, or result.” Project management, then, is “the
application of knowledge, skills, tools, and techniques to

project activities to meet project requirements.” Note that a
project in this context is indeed temporary in nature, with a
defined beginning and end. Risk management is distinct from
project management on this point because project management
incorporates concepts to lower project risk but ends with the
project, while risk management activities can continue
indefinitely.
Project management is a great concept to know as a professional
because it can be helpful in completing any set of tasks, but for
the CRISC exam, you obviously need to keep your risk hat on.
In this section, we will discuss the most common project
management frameworks and the vital concepts you need to
understand for the exam. We’re not advocating for a particular
standard to be adopted; in fact, you’ll notice a great deal of
similarity among all of the major frameworks. Most
importantly, you need to understand that implementing controls
is like any other project, in that, as the PMBOK states, it is “the
application of knowledge, skills, tools, and techniques to
project activities to meet project requirements.” The project
activities are the activities you are conducting to meet the
project requirement: a set of controls implemented and
functioning properly.
Project Management Frameworks
As we’ve said, a framework can be described as a set of laws,
best practices, policies, procedures, and processes, all wrapped
up in an implementable, established format. Project
management frameworks help provide that standardized,
industry-accepted approach toward managing projects. While all
project management frameworks differ in their content (and
sometimes context) slightly, they all contain basic steps
comprising the project initiation, the design and planning
phases of the project, the execution of that plan, the tracking of
the progress (or monitoring), and project closeout. Each of these
phases will have risks that need to be addressed, and some
frameworks even have their own specified areas that address
risk. An example is tracking the risks (perhaps using a risk

register) alongside the project goals and objectives to ensure
that all are kept within organizationally accepted tolerance
levels.
PMI-PMBOK
The Project Management Institute (PMI) Project Management
Body of Knowledge is perhaps the most recognized project
management framework internationally. The PMBOK divides
project management into process groups, knowledge areas, and
associated processes. The five process groups are as follows:
• Initiating
• Planning
• Executing
• Monitoring and Controlling
• Closing
Within the Initiating phase, you conduct your project kickoff.
This is where you get authorization to move forward with the
project, and you create the project charter. Next, you conduct
the Planning phase, where the work plan is developed. The
Executing phase is where all your hard work planning pays off;
you implement your plan and watch it come to life. Monitoring
and Controlling covers the critical points of tracking progress
against established milestones, goals, and objectives, and
conducting remediation actions as necessary. Finally, as
discussed previously, all projects have a definite life span and
must be closed out in the Closing phase, with appropriate
lessons learned documented.
There are also a number of certifications associated with the
PMBOK framework, including the Project Management
Professional (PMP), the Certified Associate in Program
Management (CAPM), and the Program Management
Professional (PgMP). While you don’t need to know about these
certifications within the scope of the CRISC exam, it’s good to
be aware of their existence because they are some of the more
widely held and respected credentials within the Project
Management field.
CMMI

The Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) framework
is an internationally recognized standard for improving
processes within organizations. Developed by Carnegie Mellon
University, the CMMI is used to gauge the process maturity
within the organization and to place it within a “maturity level.”
There are CMMI frameworks for a number of sectors, including
CMMI for Acquisition (CMMI-ACQ), CMMI for Services
(CMMI-SVC), CMMI for Development (CMMI-DEV), Data
Management Maturity (DMM), and the People CMM. You’ll see
many large companies boasting about their CMMI level; it’s
considered to be a solid gauge of the process maturity within an
organization. Why does this matter? If you want to, for
example, hire an external software developer to create and
maintain an enterprise-wide budget tool, their CMMI rating
would give you insight of how they deal with processes such as
change management.
The maturity levels range from 1 through 5.
•
Level 1 (Initial) Processes are poorly controlled and
managed
•
Level 2 (Repeatable) Processes are repeatable,
sometimes even with consistent results
•
Level 3 (Defined) Defined processes that can be
improved over time
•
Level 4 (Quantitatively Managed) Finding ways to
adapt without significant loss
•
Level 5 (Optimizing) Focus on continual
improvement of processes

CMMI doesn’t discuss risk as overtly as the PMBOK, but you
can see the same overarching elements of processes being used
to manage the different aspects of a project, including the
tracking and optimization. CMMI puts particular value on the
concept of process improvement, and organizations operating at
CMMI level 5 are actively reviewing and improving their
processes—including dealing with risk—on a regular basis.
Agile
Agile project management frameworks have been used within
the software development sector for some time. The Agile
methodologies look to improve—you’ll never guess—agility by
improving collaboration, reducing bureaucracy and red tape,
and facilitating ad hoc groups creating products in a rapid
fashion. The Agile Manifesto, released by the Agile Alliance,
reflects the following principles:
• The highest priority is to satisfy the customer through early
and continuous delivery of valuable software.
• Welcome changing requirements, even late in development.
Agile processes harness change for the customer’s competitive
advantage.
• Deliver working software frequently, from a couple of weeks
to a couple of months, with a preference to the shorter
timescale.
• Businesspeople and developers must work together daily
throughout the project.
• Build projects around motivated individuals. Give them the
environment and support they need and trust them to get the job
done.
• The most efficient and effective method of conveying
information to and within a development team is face-to-face
conversation.
• Working software is the primary measure of progress.
• Agile processes promote sustainable development. The
sponsors, developers, and users should be able to maintain a
constant pace indefinitely.

• Continuous attention to technical excellence and good design
enhance agility.
• Simplicity—the art of maximizing the amount of work not
done—is essential.
• The best architectures, requirements, and designs emerge
from self-organizing teams.
• At regular intervals, the team reflects on how to become more
effective and then tunes and adjusts its behavior accordingly.
Within this manifesto, you notice the concepts of welcoming
change (not common within many project management
frameworks) and a self-organized team (as opposed to having a
project manager formalize team membership). Finally, the
concept of iteration—from the team members reflecting
regularly on their own effectiveness and tuning accordingly to
the delivery of regular products—is central to the Agile mind-
set. While its more flexible, ad hoc project management
methodology might not be ideal for every organization, you can
definitely see how it would appeal to a certain subset of
company such as a startup.
The Agile framework (as well as the Lean framework, discussed
in the next section) differs from the PMBOK and the CMMI in
its approach and rigidity. Both Agile and Lean value the ability
to make quick changes and the ability to be more ad hoc through
the use of self-organizing teams. There is much less emphasis
on tracking through the use of metrics, and a discussion of
project risk is almost nonexistent. Still, in an organization using
these project management frameworks, risk should be
considered and incorporated into the project processes from
beginning to end.
Lean
The Lean mind-set is derived from the manufacturing sector and
is looking to “lean” organizations through less waste; in this
context, it means less waste within projects. Waste can be found
within too much unnecessary time spent on a project or
unnecessary personnel involved who could be utilized
elsewhere. Anything that does not bring value to the project is a

target for “leaning” or improving, perhaps even removal. Value
should be defined early in the project by the end customer and
often means what they will be willing to pay in the end for any
segment or part. Lean project management differs from other
frameworks by focusing efforts on improving processes to
compress the overall project schedule to reduce the project cost
and improve the profitability of the project.
A common tool used within Lean projects is the value stream
map (VSM). Within the process of creating the VSM, the team
will detail the steps, information flows, and any delays
currently resident within existing processes. This will allow the
team to better understand the current state of the processes
within the company and look for areas to reduce waste. At this
time, another, updated VSM is created to depict the leaner
process.
Project Management and Risk Management
So, you’ve learned a good bit about project management within
the previous sections, but how does it really interact with the
discussions of risk? Remember, project management covers a
defined project from start to finish and is looking to cut costs
(time, scope, and overall project cost), and managing risks can
often create new costs. However, as you read through the major
frameworks, you’ll see a few concepts that are really central
to effective risk response management: understanding the
project requirements, tracking project progress, improving
processes, and creating value. Look at how these align with the
overall risk-focused mind-set. You understand the requirements
for tracking risk so that you know the organizational contexts
and values, overarching laws and regulations, and existing
policies that you must consider when determining how you will
approach risk management. You track the progress in
implementing your chosen risk responses (and track exceptions
to the policies using your exception management process). You
improve the fundamental organizational processes by
incorporating a calculation of risk throughout all of your
projects. Finally, understanding risk creates real value for the

leadership because no project should be considered if the
overall risk of failure, for example, outweighs the reward of
success. Risk management helps your leadership succeed by
helping quantify these concepts in a way that honest
assessments can be made.
Chapter Review
In this chapter, we covered the risk response process from top
to bottom. We discussed three major risk frameworks, the NIST
RMF, the ISACA IT Risk Framework, and the ISACA COBIT.
The NIST process is comprised of six steps: security
categorization, security control selection, security control
implementation, security control assessment, information
system authorization, and security control monitoring, and it
has an important consideration of continuous monitoring. The
ISACA IT Risk Framework has three domains: Risk
Governance, Risk Evaluation, and Risk Response. COBIT is not
risk-centric or IT security–centric but is largely focused on
governance. These frameworks all differ in their scope and
content but have the same underlying goal of helping identify,
deal with, and monitor risks within an organization. We
discussed how risk response is an essential topic within all three
frameworks.
We then covered the risk response process that includes the
selection of risk response options, the prioritization of risk
response options, and the implementation of the risk response
plan. Each of these facets contains a number of key steps
involving analysis, proper communication, and consideration of
the organizational risk tolerance and risk appetite.
We then developed an understanding of the different risk
response options, including risk avoidance, risk mitigation, risk
sharing or transference, and risk acceptance. Each one of these
options has advantages and disadvantages. We also discussed
how risk responses should be selected and appropri ately
prioritized. This requires an understanding of whether a
response is a quick win (a situation where the response is high
benefit and low cost), requires a business case to be made, or

necessitates a deferral (where the risk does not outweigh the
potential cost). Each risk response choice requires careful
consideration of these options to determine the best course of
action; also, when it’s time to implement the risk responses,
knowing how to incorporate metrics, document thoroughly, and
manage exceptions to the plan is key.
We also discussed how to implement the risk mitigations after
they’ve been chosen, through the use of frameworks, both for
controls and for the overarching project management. You
learned how risk responses are assessed, through documentation
review, technical assessment, and interviews. We discussed how
to properly document risk responses and any exceptions and
report the activities to leadership. Finally, we covered training
for both content and context as a regular, repeatable activity for
personnel charged with implementing any controls.
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Discussion 3
Purpose
· Describe the risk response process.
· Evaluate risk response options and align choices with business
objectives.
· Identify the bad actors in cyberspace and compare and contrast
their resources, capabilities/techniques, motivations, and

aversion to risk. [NSA CTH 1]
· Select the optimal methodology based on needs, advantages,
and disadvantages. [NSA SRA 4]
Responding to and Mitigating Risk
When it comes to responding to risk, there is no one size fit all
approach. Individuals, businesses, and governments will need to
determine how they will deal with these risks, whether to
accept, transfer, or mitigate such risks. Understanding the
source of the risk, whether man-made or natural, will need to be
considered when responding to risks. Several other factors will
also need to be considered, including the organization’s
mission, goals and objectives, risk appetite, resources, and
capabilities. Risk response frameworks, as well as the Plan-Do-
Check-Adjust (PDCA) life cycle are good references to consult
when planning responses to risks. Whatever risk response is
chosen, it’s important to remember that low-cost responses to
high-risk scenarios are the goal of risk response prioritization.
Overview
This discussion is based on the same scenario as
Discussion 2. You’ll remember that the scenario mirrors
a natural event (world-wide pandemic), the COVID-19 outbreak,
but is based on a fictitious company. Again, feel free to make
some assumptions as you work on this module’s discussion.
Note: For this assignment, you will not be able to see
your classmates’ posts until after you post.
The scenario (Discussion 2):
You work for a U.S.-based company called Hintel, an IT
company that manufactures computer chips. The company’s
factories handle over 70 percent of its manufacturing
operations. The factories are geographically located in China,
Italy, and South Africa.
In January 2020, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC)
announced that they were responding to “an outbreak of
respiratory disease caused by a novel (new) coronavirus that
was first detected in China and which has now been detected in
more than 100 locations internationally, including in the United

States. The virus has been named SARS-CoV-2 and the disease
it causes has been named Coronavirus Disease 2019
(abbreviated COVID-19). On January 30, 2020, the
International Health Regulations Emergency Committee of the
World Health Organization (WHO) declared the outbreak a
public health emergency on International concern.1
Since January 30, 2020 when the outbreak was declared a public
health emergency, many businesses have suffered major
financial losses due to a temporary loss of confidence in
financial markets, restricted movements, and in the case of
“Hintel”, the closures of its major factories in China and Italy.
The company currently reports approximately $75m in losses
per day as a result of this pandemic.”
1
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-
updates/summary.html
Include the following in your post:
· As the CIO of “Hintel”, you have been summoned by the
organization’s board to share your response plans. Identify and
explain 3 to 5 risk response options that you would share with
the board. Note that these points could essentially be included
in your disaster recovery plan.
· Describe 3 to 5 factors that you would consider when
evaluating the risk response options that you shared above,
bearing in mind the importance of establishing and maintaining
trust throughout the process.
· Pandemics such as COVID-19 may enable bad actors in
cyberspace to harm businesses. Identify and describe potential
opportunities that these actors could exploit to harm businesses.
· Describe technical controls “Hintel” could implement to
reduce cybersecurity-related risks from these bad actors.
Action Items
1. Create discussion post according to the directions in the
overview.
2. Read the assignment rubric to understand how your work will

be assessed.
Module:
Here are the resources you need to prepare for this module:
·
Chapter 5, Risk Response and Mitigation
(Links to an external site.), in Rogers & Dunkerley
(2016)
·
The Phoenix Project: Remediation of a Cybersecurity
Crisis at the University of Virginia
(Links to an external site.) Case Study
·
NIST Guide for Conducting Risk Assessments
(Links to an external site.)
·
The Three Ts of the Cyber Economy

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