CIS Controls v8 17.6 — Define Mechanisms for Communicating During Incident Response

What this control requires

Determine which primary and secondary mechanisms will be used to communicate and report during a security incident. Mechanisms can include phone calls, emails, or letters. Keep in mind that certain mechanisms, such as emails, can be affected during a security incident. Review annually, or when significant enterprise changes occur that could impact this Safeguard.

In plain English

Determine which primary and secondary mechanisms will be used to communicate and report during a security incident. In practice, this means you can prove you define response-level controls on a defined cadence.

Why it matters

The CIS Controls are an industry-vetted, prioritised defence: skipping a safeguard widens the attack surface that the safeguards above and below it assume is closed. Audit frameworks (FedRAMP, PCI DSS, HIPAA) all cite CIS as evidence of due care.

This control is rated high. Auditors expect a named owner, a remediation SLA, and a tooling artefact that evidences continuous operation.

What an auditor looks for

A CIS-aligned reviewer wants to see (a) which Implementation Group you are targeting, (b) a documented owner for the safeguard, and (c) a tooling or process artefact (config, scan output, ticket) that proves the safeguard runs on the cadence the control demands.

Within Respond, the assessor will trace your implementation back to the catalogue reference (Control 17.6) and look for objective evidence on the latest two assessment cycles.

How to implement

Incident Response

Runbook. Maintain a runbook keyed by incident type with named roles (IC, comms, scribe), an out-of-band comms channel, and a 72-hour timeline for external notification.

Tabletop. Run a quarterly tabletop exercise (ransomware, insider, supply-chain) and feed gaps back into the runbook.

Operational checklist

• Define. Document the trigger, the owner and the cadence.
• Scope: response, security incident, phone calls, emails, letters, enterprise.

Evidence to collect

• Ticketing Workflow. ticketing_workflow evidence

Workflow metrics (ServiceNow, Jira) show approvals and remediation. Focus: Define Mechanisms for Communicating During Incident Response.

Common pitfalls

• Runbooks that name a role but no person, or list a paging channel that no longer exists.

How it maps to other frameworks

Computed from shared tags, control component and key-operation subjects — handy when you are reconciling controls across an audit.

• NIST SP 800-171 Rev. 3 3.6.2 — Incident Monitoring, Reporting, and Response Assistance
• SOC 2 (2017 TSC) CC7.4 — Incident Response
• NIST SP 800-53 Rev. 5 IR-6 — Incident Reporting
• BSI C5:2020 SIM-03 — Documentation and reporting of security incidents
• ISO/IEC 27001:2022 A.5.27 — Learning from information security incidents

Related controls in CIS Controls v8

• Control 17.4 — Establish and Maintain an Incident Response Process
• Control 17.9 — Establish and Maintain Security Incident Thresholds
• Control 17.5 — Assign Key Roles and Responsibilities
• Control 17.8 — Conduct Post-Incident Reviews
• Control 5.3 — Disable Dormant Accounts
• Control 11.2 — Perform Automated Backups

References

• Center for Internet Security — CIS Controls v8
• Catalogue identifier: Control 17.6

Topics: incident responsechange management