April 16, 2018 1.0 Cybersecurity Framework Version 1.1 Framework Introduction The United States depends on the reliable functioning of its critical infrastructure. Cybersecurity threats exploit the increased complexity and connectivity of critical infrastructure systems, placing the Nation’s security, economy, and public safety and health at risk. Similar to financial and reputational risks, cybersecurity risk affects a company’s bottom line. It can drive up costs and affect revenue. It can harm an organization’s ability to innovate and to gain and maintain customers. Cybersecurity can be an important and amplifying component of an organization’s overall risk management. To strengthen the resilience of this infrastructure, the Cybersecurity Enhancement Act of 20142 (CEA) updated the role of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to “facilitate and support the development of” cybersecurity risk frameworks. Through CEA, NIST must identify “a prioritized, flexible, repeatable, performance-based, and cost-effective approach, including information security measures and controls that may be voluntarily adopted by owners and operators of critical infrastructure to help them identify, assess, and manage cyber risks.” This formalized NIST’s previous work developing Framework Version 1.0 under Executive Order 13636, “Improving Critical Infrastructure Cybersecurity,” issued in February 20133, and provided guidance for future Framework evolution. Critical infrastructure4 is defined in the U.S. Patriot Act of 20015 as “systems and assets, whether physical or virtual, so vital to the United States that the incapacity or destruction of such systems and assets would have a debilitating impact on security, national economic security, national public health or safety, or any combination of those matters.” Due to the increasing pressures from external and internal threats, organizations responsible for critical infrastructure need to have a consistent and iterative approach to identifying, assessing, and managing cybersecurity risk. This approach is necessary regardless of an organization’s size, threat exposure, or cybersecurity sophistication today. The critical infrastructure community includes public and private owners and operators, and other entities with a role in securing the Nation’s infrastructure. Members of each critical infrastructure sector perform functions that are supported by the broad category of technology, including information technology (IT), industrial control systems (ICS), cyber-physical systems (CPS), and connected devices more generally, including the Internet of Things (IoT). This reliance on technology, communication, and interconnectivity has changed and expanded the potential vulnerabilities and increased potential risk to operations. For example, as technology and the data it produces and processes are increasingly used to deliver critical services and support business/mission decisions, the potential impacts of a cybersecurity incident on an 2 See 15 U.S.C. § 272(e)(1)(A)(i). The Cybersecurity Enhancement Act of 2014 (S.1353) became public law 113274 on December 18, 2014 and may be found at: https://www.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/senatebill/1353/text. 3 Executive Order no. 13636, Improving Critical Infrastructure Cybersecurity, DCPD-201300091, February 12, 2013. https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CFR-2014-title3-vol1/pdf/CFR-2014-title3-vol1-eo13636.pdf 4 The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Critical Infrastructure program provides a listing of the sectors and their associated critical functions and value chains. http://www.dhs.gov/critical-infrastructure-sectors 5 See 42 U.S.C. § 5195c(e)). The U.S. Patriot Act of 2001 (H.R.3162) became public law 107-56 on October 26, 2001 and may be found at: https://www.congress.gov/bill/107th-congress/house-bill/3162 This publication is available free of charge from: https://doi.org/10.6028/NIST.CSWP.04162018 1