What is a Cyber Security Risk Assessment Checklist?
A cyber security risk assessment checklist is an outline of information that organizations require when performing due diligence during the vendor procurement process. A risk assessment checklist will typically include a list of data points that must be collected from the vendors themselves as well as from external sources.
Essentials of a Cyber Security Risk Assessment Checklist
While there are no universal standards for a cyber security risk assessment checklist, there are certain data points that should be included in all risk assessment questionnaires to efficiently evaluate security risk. Every security risk assessment should be customized to the industry or size of your organization, but there are some best practices we can recommend to be included across the board when measuring overall risk.
Essential information on a cyber security risk assessment checklist should include:
- Basic company information, including articles of incorporation, business license, overview of company structure, bios of executives and board members, proof of location, and references from credible sources.
- Financial information, including tax documents, balance sheets, loans and liabilities, list of major assets, and compensation structure for executives. This information is mostly helpful in determining whether a vendor is financially solvent and paying their taxes.
- Political and reputational risk, including questions that identify corruption or political weakness that could represent risk for your organization. You’ll want to check the organization against key watch lists and global sanction lists, and check key personnel against politically exposed persons (PEP) lists and law enforcement lists. You’ll also want to look for complaints, negative reviews, negative news reports, and litigation history.
- Operational risk information identifies whether the vendor is exposed to operational risks that could negatively impact your company. It’s helpful to know whether the vendor has a disaster preparedness plan and a business continuity plan, and to check for employee turnover rates and employee lawsuits that may indicate a toxic culture.
- Cyber risk information should include an outline of IT systems, history of data breaches, results of penetration tests, and results of security awareness testing. You’ll also want to include a cyber risk assessment questionnaire that discovers the governance and organizational structure for managing cyber risk within the vendor organization and the security and controls technology for mitigating it.
While it’s important to measure total risk of a new vendor or network integration, cybersecurity risk mitigation and assessment is critical to protecting your own organization’s cybersecurity status. Bitsight’s technology provides manageable tools to complement and improve your cyber security risk assessments.
Managing Vendors With a Risk Assessment Checklist
A cyber security risk assessment checklist is an important tool for due diligence in the vendor procurement process. Checklists typically outline the information that should be collected from a prospective vendor to assess the risk it may pose to the organization. Because data breaches that originate with third parties are becoming increasingly common, cyber security risk assessment checklists must focus heavily on understanding the security posture of third-party vendors.
While assessment checklists play a valuable role in managing third-party ecosystems, they must be augmented with tools for continuous monitoring risk in vendor networks. Most of the data collected through checklists offers only a point-in-time snapshot of a company’s security posture, and relies on the accuracy of the vendor’s self-reporting. To manage risk more effectively, organizations need solutions that can provide immediate alerts when a vendor’s security posture changes or security performance degrades, as well as verifies the information the organization receives from a vendor.
For security and risk leaders who want to learn how to mitigate third party risk more effectively, Bitsight Third-Party Risk Management offers automated tools that continuously measure and monitor the security performance of vendors.
