CIS Controls v8 9.7 — Deploy and Maintain Email Server Anti-Malware Protections

What this control requires

Deploy and maintain email server anti-malware protections, such as attachment scanning and/or sandboxing.

In plain English

Deploy and maintain email server anti-malware protections, such as attachment scanning and/or sandboxing. In practice, this means you can prove you deploy email-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.

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 Protect, the assessor will trace your implementation back to the catalogue reference (Control 9.7) and look for objective evidence on the latest two assessment cycles.

How to implement

Endpoint Protection

MDM. Make MDM enrollment a hard gate for device access (Intune compliance + Conditional Access, or Jamf + Okta device trust). Unmanaged devices simply don't get a session token.

EDR. Deploy CrowdStrike / SentinelOne / Defender for Endpoint to every server and laptop; alert on any host that stops sending telemetry for >24h.

Vulnerability Management

Scanners. Pair an unauthenticated scanner (Nessus / Qualys / Tenable.io) for external surface with an authenticated agent for OS/library CVEs on every host.

SLA. Document remediation SLAs by CVSS / EPSS: critical 7 days, high 30 days, medium 90 days; report monthly trend to leadership.

Containers. Scan images in CI (Trivy / Grype / Snyk Container) AND at runtime; block deploys on critical findings without exception.

Operational checklist

• Deploy. Document the trigger, the owner and the cadence.
• Deploy And Maintain. Document the trigger, the owner and the cadence.
• Protect. Document the trigger, the owner and the cadence.
• Scope: email, vulnerability, email server anti-malware protections, edr.

Evidence to collect

• Edr Scan. edr_scan evidence
• Infra Scan. Continuous infrastructure-posture telemetry — AWS Config, Azure Policy compliance, GCP Organisation Policy, Wiz / Prisma findings.

EDR telemetry (CrowdStrike, Defender for Endpoint) confirms threat detection. Focus: Deploy and Maintain Email Server Anti-Malware Protections.

Common pitfalls

• Pilot MDM rollouts that quietly exclude executives or engineers; carving out the highest-risk users is the most common audit failure.
• Scans that hit only the perimeter; missing authenticated scans of OS, runtime libs and base images so most CVEs are invisible.

Related controls in CIS Controls v8

• Control 10.6 — Centrally Manage Anti-Malware Software
• Control 10.1 — Deploy and Maintain Anti-Malware Software
• Control 10.7 — Use Behavior-Based Anti-Malware Software
• Control 10.4 — Configure Automatic Anti-Malware Scanning of Removable Media
• Control 13.2 — Deploy a Host-Based Intrusion Detection Solution
• Control 13.11 — Tune Security Event Alerting Thresholds

References

• Center for Internet Security — CIS Controls v8
• Catalogue identifier: Control 9.7

Topics: governance riskedr xdrendpoint protectionthreat intelligencevulnerability management