NIST 800-53 REV 5 • CONTINGENCY PLANNING
CP-10(6) — Component Protection
Protect system components used for recovery and reconstitution.
Supplemental Guidance
Protection of system recovery and reconstitution components (i.e., hardware, firmware, and software) includes physical and technical controls. Backup and restoration components used for recovery and reconstitution include router tables, compilers, and other system software.
Practitioner Notes
This enhancement requires protection of system components that are essential for recovery — if your recovery tools themselves are compromised or destroyed, you cannot recover.
Example 1: Store your recovery tools (restore software, OS installation media, configuration scripts) in a secure, offline location separate from production systems.
Example 2: Maintain offline copies of your Ansible playbooks or Terraform scripts in a secure vault so you can rebuild infrastructure even if your Git repository is compromised.