Vendor Security Starter Kit

Most organizations cannot answer the first question a customer, auditor or insurer asks about vendor security: which of your vendors hold your sensitive data or have access to your systems? This kit gets you that answer and keeps it current.

The workbook takes you through inventory, owner assignment, data and access classification, criticality scoring, evidence tracking, a basic risk score, a review calendar and a remediation tracker. Classification tabs ask plain yes or no questions and suggest the class, so the debate is short. Every tab looks vendors up by ID, so you can sort and filter freely without breaking anything.

A worked example walks through a managed IT provider with domain admin rights and no proof of MFA, the kind of vendor that is one of the most common routes into small and mid-sized organizations.

What is included

1. Vendor Security Starter Kit Guide (PDF): the two-week setup, where vendors hide, how to classify and score, what evidence to ask for by tier, a worked example.

2. Vendor Security Starter Workbook (Excel): inventory, owners, data classification, access classification, criticality, security evidence, basic risk score, review calendar, remediation tracker, review checklist, offboarding checklist, scoring guide.

3. Vendor Security Intake Form (Word).

4. Vendor Security Review Checklist (Word).

5. Vendor Security Evidence Request email template with follow-up schedule (Word).

6. Vendor Offboarding Checklist (Word).

Who it is for

IT managers and directors, security engineers and analysts, compliance and risk managers, operations leaders and MSP teams at organizations of roughly 25 to 500 people that depend on outside providers but do not have a dedicated third-party risk function.

Formats

PDF guide, Excel workbook, 4 Word templates.

License

License. Your purchase grants one organization a perpetual, non-exclusive license to use, copy, and modify these materials for its own internal security program, including sharing completed questionnaires and contract exhibits with its own vendors. You may not resell, sublicense, or redistribute the templates themselves, in original or modified form, as a product. Consultants and managed service providers who want to use the materials across multiple client organizations need a practitioner license; contact cyberauctoritas.com.

Disclaimer

This material is provided for general information and internal program building. It is not legal advice and does not certify compliance with any law, regulation, or framework. Contract language must be reviewed by qualified counsel before use. Adapt every document to your organization, your risk tolerance, and your obligations.