NIST SP 800-53 Rev. 5 CM-3(6) — Cryptography Management

What this control requires

Ensures cryptographic mechanisms under configuration management to maintain security controls like identification and authentication. This control supports the Cryptography Management System capability within the Configuration Management family.

In plain English

Ensures cryptographic mechanisms under configuration management to maintain security controls like identification and authentication. In practice, this means you can prove you access 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 Configuration Management, the assessor will trace your implementation back to the catalogue reference (Control CM-3(6)) and look for objective evidence on the latest two assessment cycles.

How to implement

Configuration Management

Policy-as-code. Codify the control as Service Control Policies (AWS), Azure Policy initiatives, or Organisation Policy (GCP) so the platform enforces what the document promises.

IaC. Gate Terraform / Pulumi / CloudFormation changes with Checkov / tfsec / OPA so misconfigurations never reach production.

Drift. Run a CSPM (Wiz / Prisma / Defender for Cloud / Security Command Center) over every account and route findings to a single risk register.

Operational checklist

• Access. Document the trigger, the owner and the cadence.
• Security. Document the trigger, the owner and the cadence.
• Configuration. Document the trigger, the owner and the cadence.
• Review. Document the trigger, the owner and the cadence.
• Authentication. Document the trigger, the owner and the cadence.
• Scope: management, authentication, system, controls, security controls, identity, configuration, review.

Evidence to collect

• Identity Scan. IAM / IdP exports — Entra ID, Okta, IAM Identity Center, Workspace directory — showing accounts, roles, MFA state and last sign-in.

Identity analytics (Okta, SailPoint, Access Analyzer) demonstrates least-privilege. Focus: Cryptography Management.

Common pitfalls

• Manual cloud-console changes that never make it back to Terraform — drift accumulates until the next outage forces a reconciliation.

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 3.4.2 — Configuration Settings
• CIS Controls v8 9.2 — Use DNS Filtering Services
• ISO/IEC 27001:2022 A.5.2 — Information security roles and responsibilities
• SOC 2 (2017 TSC) CC6.1 — Logical Access Controls
• ISO/IEC 27701:2025 A.3.8 — Identity management

Related controls in NIST SP 800-53 Rev. 5

• Control AC-14 — Permitted Actions Without Identification Or Authentication
• Control IA-4(1) — Prohibit Account Identifiers As Public Identifiers
• Control IA-5(5) — Change Authenticators Prior To Delivery
• Control IA-5(12) — Biometric Authentication Performance
• Control CM-5(4) — Dual Authorization
• Control IA-4 — Identifier Management

References

• NIST Computer Security Resource Center — NIST SP 800-53 Rev. 5
• Catalogue identifier: Control CM-3(6)

Topics: identity accessidentity managementaccess reviewprivileged accessconfiguration management