NIST SP 800-53 Rev. 5 SC-42(1) — Reporting To Authorized Individuals Or Roles

What this control requires

Ensure that the system is configured to report data or information collected by designated sensors exclusively to authorized individuals or roles. This prevents unauthorized entities from receiving sensitive data gathered by sensors, even if they are activated by authorized personnel. This control supports the Sensor control systems and data reporting mechanisms capability within the System and Communications Protection family.

In plain English

Ensure that the system is configured to report data or information collected by designated sensors exclusively to authorized individuals or roles. 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 System and Communications Protection, the assessor will trace your implementation back to the catalogue reference (Control SC-42(1)) and look for objective evidence on the latest two assessment cycles.

How to implement

1. Write a short policy stating intent, scope and named owner.
2. Encode it as a platform guardrail — SCP, Azure Policy initiative, Organisation Policy, or repository policy.
3. Wire a monitoring signal that catches drift (CSPM rule, SIEM rule, scheduled query, Workspace alert) and ticket it.
4. Review on a documented cadence and capture the review in the risk register or compliance tracker.

Operational checklist

• Access. Document the trigger, the owner and the cadence.
• Information. Document the trigger, the owner and the cadence.
• Data. Document the trigger, the owner and the cadence.
• Review. Document the trigger, the owner and the cadence.
• Protection. Document the trigger, the owner and the cadence.
• Scope: management, information, system, personnel, protection, identity, review, capability.

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: Reporting To Authorized Individuals Or Roles.

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 3.9.1 — Personnel Screening
• 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) CC6.6 — Boundary Protection
• BSI C5:2020 IDM-08 — Confidentiality of authentication information

Related controls in NIST SP 800-53 Rev. 5

• Control SC-8(5) — Protected Distribution System
• Control PE-15(1) — Automation Support
• Control MP-2 — Media Access
• Control PS-6(3) — Post-Employment Requirements
• Control SC-23 — Session Authenticity
• Control PS-6(2) — Classified Information Requiring Special Protection

References

• NIST Computer Security Resource Center — NIST SP 800-53 Rev. 5
• Catalogue identifier: Control SC-42(1)

Topics: identity accessidentity managementaccess reviewprivileged access