1.4 Understanding Compliance Evaluation Tools

The security check and policy template reports help you determine the risk areas in your enterprise, and then prioritize the security risks that you found. You can use the reported scores to determine whether your systems are trending toward or away from the security policies and baselines set by your organization. Secure Configuration Manager provides tools to help you evaluate the report results. You can use these tools to browse the data for the asset out of compliance to see exactly how the asset failed and how to remediate the issue.

Tool	Description
Asset Compliance View	This console-based overview of your environment’s compliance enables console users to: View the overall compliance of their IT assets Perform a granular assessment of specific groups and computers Identify which IT assets are out of compliance with the enterprise’s security standard Determine whether the exposed system vulnerability poses a high, medium, or low risk For more information, see Section 5.4, Using the Asset Compliance View for Evaluation.
Secure Configuration Manager Dashboard	This Web-based overview of your environment’s compliance enables executives and managers to: View the overall compliance of their IT assets Perform a granular assessment of specific groups and computers View the overall posture and trends of security compliance at a single glance For more information, see Section 5.5, Using the Secure Configuration Manager Dashboard for Evaluation.
Security Checkup Results Viewer	This Web-based tool enables managers and console users to remotely audit enterprise security by reviewing which assets are in compliance, out of compliance, or have an unknown compliance. For more information, see Section 5.6, Using the Security Checkup Results Viewer for Evaluation.

Tool

Description

Asset Compliance View

This console-based overview of your environment’s compliance enables console users to:

View the overall compliance of their IT assets
Perform a granular assessment of specific groups and computers
Identify which IT assets are out of compliance with the enterprise’s security standard
Determine whether the exposed system vulnerability poses a high, medium, or low risk

For more information, see Section 5.4, Using the Asset Compliance View for Evaluation.

Secure Configuration Manager Dashboard

This Web-based overview of your environment’s compliance enables executives and managers to:

View the overall compliance of their IT assets
Perform a granular assessment of specific groups and computers
View the overall posture and trends of security compliance at a single glance

For more information, see Section 5.5, Using the Secure Configuration Manager Dashboard for Evaluation.

Security Checkup Results Viewer

This Web-based tool enables managers and console users to remotely audit enterprise security by reviewing which assets are in compliance, out of compliance, or have an unknown compliance. For more information, see Section 5.6, Using the Security Checkup Results Viewer for Evaluation.

Secure Configuration Manager can notify you automatically when an asset falls out of compliance. Receiving notifications can help you expedite the remediation process. Also, every organization has complex workflows and change management processes that require adherence. Sending out-of-compliance alerts to a change management ticketing system uses your company-defined workflow to quickly address assets that fall out of compliance. For more information about automatic notifications, see Section 5.8, Automating Compliance Notification.