NIST SP 800-53 Rev. 5 AC-4(10) — Enable And Disable Security Or Privacy Policy Filters

What this control requires

Organizations must provide privileged administrators with the ability to enable and disable defined security or privacy policy filters under specific conditions. Administrators can enable filters to accommodate approved data types and select filters based on the type of data being transferred, the security domains of the source and destination, and other relevant security or privacy features. This control supports the Governance capability within the Access Control family.

In plain English

Organizations must provide privileged administrators with the ability to enable and disable defined security or privacy policy filters under specific conditions. In practice, this means you can prove you policy management-level controls on a defined cadence.

Why it matters

SP 800-53 is the catalogue every U.S. federal authorisation (FedRAMP, FISMA, CMMC) and most regulated industries point at. A missing control surfaces as a Plan of Action & Milestones (POA&M) item that an Authorizing Official must approve before the Authority To Operate is granted or renewed.

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 3PAO (FedRAMP) or Independent Assessor (NIST RMF) tests against NIST SP 800-53A assessment procedures. For each control they expect a documented implementation that addresses every assessment objective (Examine, Interview, Test) and an implementation summary in the System Security Plan.

Within Access Control, the assessor will trace your implementation back to the catalogue reference (Control AC-4(10)) and look for objective evidence on the latest two assessment cycles.

How to implement

Policy Management

Docs. Keep each policy in version-controlled Markdown alongside the code that implements it; ship a signed PDF snapshot at each annual review and link the SHA into the SoA.

Operational checklist

• Policy. Document the trigger, the owner and the cadence.
• Disable. Document the trigger, the owner and the cadence.
• Access. Document the trigger, the owner and the cadence.
• Security. Document the trigger, the owner and the cadence.
• Enable. Document the trigger, the owner and the cadence.
• Scope: management, conditions, access control, privacy, domains, data types, privacy policy filters, source.

Evidence to collect

• Policy Document. A signed and version-controlled policy / standard / procedure document.

Signed policy or standard documents the safeguard. Focus: Enable And Disable Security Or Privacy Policy Filters.

Common pitfalls

• Policies that no engineer has read; the version in Confluence drifts from the version that's actually being enforced.

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 3.1.9 — System Use Notification
• HIPAA (45 CFR Part 164) 164.310(a)(2)(iii) — Facility Access Controls - Access Control and Validation Procedures
• BSI C5:2020 SP-03 — Exceptions from Existing Policies and Instructions

Related controls in NIST SP 800-53 Rev. 5

• Control AC-4(11) — Configuration Of Security Or Privacy Policy Filters
• Control AC-4(19) — Validation Of Metadata
• Control AC-4(9) — Human Reviews
• Control AC-4(5) — Embedded Data Types
• Control AC-4(1) — Object Security And Privacy Attributes
• Control AC-4(14) — Security Or Privacy Policy Filter Constraints

References

• NIST Computer Security Resource Center — NIST SP 800-53 Rev. 5
• Catalogue identifier: Control AC-4(10)

Topics: governance riskprivileged accesspolicy managementprivacy management