NIST 800-171 Questionnaire Template

What is a NIST 800-171 questionnaire template?

Organizations use a NIST 800-171 questionnaire template to evaluate the effectiveness of a vendor's security control strategy for protecting CUI. Although NIST 800-171 was originally designed for nonfederated entities processing federal data, any organization can adopt its standards to enhance its sensitive data protection practices.

Any organization can implement NIST 800-171 to increase the security of their sensitive information.

Key changes in revision 3 of NIST 800-171

This latest version of NIST 800-171 is revision 3, the version the downloadable questionnaire available on this page maps to. NIST 800-171 version 3 introduces several changes:

1. Integration with NIST SP 800-53 (Revision 5): Revision 3 aligns more closely with the security and privacy controls outlined in NIST SP 800-53, enhancing consistency and reducing redundancy. This alignment helps create a more streamlined approach to security, making it easier for organizations already familiar with NIST SP 800-53 to adopt and implement the controls.
2. New Control Enhancements: Revision 3 introduces new control enhancements to bolster cybersecurity measures, including secure software development and advanced data protection mechanisms. These enhancements provide additional layers of defense against modern threats, such as supply chain attacks, and sophisticated cyber intrusions, such as Advanced Persistent Threats.
3. Focus on Cyber Resilience: Enhanced emphasis on maintaining system and data resilience against sophisticated cyber threats, particularly supply chain vulnerabilities. Organizations are encouraged to develop strategies that not only prevent supply chain attacks but also ensure rapid recovery and continuity in the event of a security incident.
4. Continuous Monitoring and Assessment: Expanded guidelines for ongoing monitoring and assessment to maintain a robust security posture in rapidly changing threat environments. Organizations must now prioritize continuous improvement and adapt their security measures to counter emerging threats effectively.
5. Clarity and Flexibility in Control Implementation: More precise language and guidance on control implementation to provide flexibility while ensuring compliance. This allows organizations of different sizes and industries to tailor the controls to their unique environments without compromising security.

Why is a NIST 800-171 questionnaire template important?

A NIST 800-171 questionniare template is important for organizations managing or sharing Controlled Unclassified Information with their third-party vendors. A NIST 800-171 revision 3 template is also essential for businesses aiming to align with the standard to bolster the data security practices of their third-party vendors.

There are six reasons why a NIST 800-171 template might be important for your business:

• Streamlines Vendor Risk Management: A NIST 800-171 risk questionnaire template provides a repeatable and standardized approach to assessing a vendor's security standards.
• Supports NIST 800-53 compliance: A NIST 800-171 template could support compliance with NIST 800-53, a standard NIST 800-171 aligns with more closely in revision 3. This template could also streamline compliance with the Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA).
• Enhances risk management: The exemplary data security standard outlined in a NIST 800-171 template could improve internal and external risk management efforts, helping security teams proactively identify and remediate security vulnerabilities impacting sensitive data safety before they're exploited.
• Facilitates cross-industry adoption: Although originally intended for federal contractors, the NIST 800-171 template is adaptable to any industry and data risk management framework.
• Improves cybersecurity reputation: Using a NIST 800-171 template to enhance your security profile could increase your chances of winning partnership proposals from organizations expecting exemplary cybersecurity standards from their vendors.
• Protects sensitive information: The NIST 800-171 standard was specifically designed to safeguard Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI). By using a NIST 800-171 template, organizations can align their data security practices with a standard trusted to protect sensitive government data. Since government data is the most critical category of sensitive data, such an alignment will likely result in a very high chance of reducing the risk of unauthorized access to sensitive information.

NIST 800-171 questionnaire template example

Here is an example snapshot of the NIST 800-171 questionnaire template available for you to download:

This questionnaire template example divides vendor security control queries across the seventeen control families of NIST 800-171 revision 3:

• Access Control (AC): Manages who can access systems and CUI, ensuring only authorized users have access.
• Awareness and Training (AT): Ensures personnel are trained on security risks and responses.
• Audit and Accountability (AU): Involves logging and monitoring user activities to detect and respond to security incidents.
• Configuration Management (CM): Controls system changes to prevent unauthorized modifications and ensure secure configurations.
• Identification and Authentication (IA): Verifies user identities before granting access to systems and data.
• Incident Response (IR): Outlines procedures for detecting and responding to security incidents.
• Maintenance (MA): Ensures systems are regularly maintained and updated to prevent vulnerabilities.
• Media Protection (MP): Protects data stored on physical media, ensuring secure handling and disposal.
• Personnel Security (PS): Manages risks related to personnel who access sensitive information.
• Physical Protection (PE): Controls physical access to systems and protects against environmental hazards.
• Risk Assessment (RA): Identifies and assesses risks to inform security decisions and priorities.
• Security Assessment and Monitoring (CA): Focuses on continuous monitoring and assessment of security controls to ensure they remain effective.
• System and Communications Protection (SC): Protects data in transit and at rest through encryption and secure communication.
• System and Information Integrity (SI): Ensures system integrity by preventing malware, unauthorized changes, and data corruption.
• Planning (PL): Involves creating a security plan that aligns with business goals and long-term strategies.
• System and Services Acquisition (SA): Ensures that security requirements are considered when acquiring and developing new systems or services.
• Supply Chain Risk Management (SR): Manages risks associated with third-party vendors and suppliers, ensuring their security practices align with NIST 800-171 requirements

How to complete the NIST 800-171 questionnaire template

The NIST 800-171 template provided on this page is divided into two sections, one to be completed by the vendor receiving the questionnaire and the other to be completed internally based on the vendor's responses.

1. Vendor Component of the NIST 800-171 Template: Vendors need to answer each question with "Yes," "No," or "Not Applicable" and provide implementation details. To support internal risk treatment efforts, whenever the options "No" or "Not Applicable" are chosen, vendors should provide a reason for their choice in the Implementation Details column.
2. Internal Component of the NIST 800-171 Template: After receiving the vendor's responses, internal teams will evaluate the risk severity (e.g., High, Medium, Low) associated with each response and determine an appropriate risk treatment. Upon completion, internal security teams should clearly understand which remediation actions they must respond to first.

How to choose a risk treatment rating

The following guide will help determine the appropriate risk treatment level for each questionnaire response.

• High: This option should be chosen if there is a significant chance of sensitive data compromise if the corresponding risk is not addressed in a timely manner. High-risk questionnaire responses are likely indicators of data breach attack vectors.
• Medium: Choose this option when a risk is significant but not immediately threatening. Medium risks will likely result in moderate damages if exploited, where damage is either calculated as financial impact or degree of impact on an organization's security posture. A medium severity ratings also help security teams understand which remediation responses are safe to delay temporarily, ensuring resources are allocated to addressing critical risks first.
• Low: This rating is attributed to risks unlikely to cause significant harm to the organization. These risks could be safe to absorb and not addressed with a risk treatment plan. 

How to use this questionnaire template to track a vendor's compliance with NIST 800-171

This downloadable NIST 800-171 template can be used to systematically evaluate each vendor's alignment with the data security standards of NIST 800-171 revision 3. Follow this 6-step guide to use this template as part of your Vendor Risk Management processes.

Step 1: Understand the objectives of all control families

Each control family in this NIST 800-171 template focuses on a different aspect of data security.  For example, the "Access Control" family focuses on who can access systems and data, while the "Incident Response" family outlines procedures for responding to security breaches. Understanding the objectives of each control family is essential for understanding a vendor's baseline of alignment across each risk category when completing the internal component of this NIST 800-171 questionnaire template.

Step 2: Customize the questionnaire

Organizations voluntarily aligning their Vendor Risk Management practices with NIST 800-171 should modify the NIST 800-171 questionnaire template to focus on the risk domains most aligned with their third-party security objectives. For vendors handling highly sensitive CUI, very little modification will likely be required, as a more stringent assessment across all control families may be necessary. Customizing the questionnaire ensures you are not wasting resources assessing irrelevant controls while concentrating on areas critical to securing your external attack surface.

Step 3: Send the questionnaire

Distribute the questionnaire to your vendors, requesting all "Implementation Detail" fields be filled in regardless of a vendor's response to a question. The more detail a vendor can provide about their cybersecurity practices, the more efficient your resulting risk treatment strategy can be.

Step 4: Evaluate risk severity 

Assess the vendor responses to evaluate the severity of identified risks. Use this evaluation to guide your organization's decisions about which risks should be prioritized in a risk treatment plan. Refer to the guide above when deciding which risk severity level to attribute to each response. 

Step 5: Develop a risk treatment plan

For all identified risks, especially those of high or medium severity, develop a detailed risk treatment plan. This could include implementing additional controls, bolstering existing controls, requesting policy changes, or enhancing monitoring measures.

A well-crafted risk treatment plan:

• Cleary indicates which should be prioritized in remediation efforts
• Specifies responsible parties for all identified risks
• Sets clear deadlines for all remediation tasks
• Outlines clear action plans
• Defines a process for overseeing the complete risk management lifecycle

Step 6: Monitor ongoing compliance

Evaluate each vendor's ongoing alignment with this NIST 800-171 questionnaire template regularly. Ideally, such point-in-time evaluations should be coupled with a means of tracking third-party security posture changes in real time, as this effort could reveal emerging risks impacting NIST 800-171 alignment between official assessment schedules.