Integrating the NIST CSF into Third-Party Risk Management: Strategies for Enhanced Security and Compliance

Third-party risk management (TPRM) professionals evaluate service providers from a range of industries and geographies, meaning many of the third parties they work with operate based on different regulatory standards, often with hugely varied access permissions, responsibilities and internal cybersecurity policies. This can lead to apples-to-oranges comparisons: without a standardized framework to cover their own cybersecurity policies and those of their vendors, analysts may be forced to make imprecise, time-consuming and difficult comparisons between one organization’s policies and another’s.

For this reason, the NIST Cybersecurity Framework (CSF) is a valuable tool for TPRM professionals: by standardizing the implementation, evaluation and documentation of cybersecurity practices within the organization and providing guidance for managing cyber risk in the third-party ecosystem, NIST CSF enables faster, more authoritative evaluation of third parties’ policies and their potential impact on the organization’s risk posture.

This white paper will cover the NIST CSF functions and maturity scale, NIST supply chain requirements and tips for integrating NIST into your TPRM program.