NIST CSF 2.0 Security Assessment Tool — Cybersecurity Maturity Rating

Free interactive NIST Cybersecurity Framework 2.0 assessment tool. Rate your organization across all 6 functions and 19 categories. Get a maturity tier score, radar chart, gap analysis, and exportable report.

← Cybersecurity Studio
About this tool — how it works & FAQOpen ▾Close ▴

About the NIST CSF 2.0 Assessment Tool

This tool implements the NIST Cybersecurity Framework 2.0 (published February 2024) assessment structure. Rate your organization's cybersecurity practices across all 6 functions and 19 categories on a 1–4 maturity scale. Results appear live as a radar chart, per-function score bars, gap analysis showing your lowest-rated categories, and an overall maturity tier. Export your completed assessment as a plain-text report.

The six NIST CSF 2.0 functions

GOVERN (GV) — New in CSF 2.0: sets cybersecurity strategy, policy, roles, and supply chain risk management at the executive level. Without a strong GV score, the other five functions lack authority and resources.

IDENTIFY (ID) — Understand the assets, systems, data, and risks that need protecting. You cannot protect what you haven't inventoried.

PROTECT (PR) — Implement safeguards: access control, awareness training, data encryption, system hardening, and resilience planning.

DETECT (DE) — Monitor continuously and analyze anomalies to find cybersecurity events before they become incidents.

RESPOND (RS) — Execute incident response plans: manage, analyze, communicate, contain, and learn from incidents.

RECOVER (RC) — Restore capabilities after incidents and incorporate lessons learned into future planning.

Maturity tiers — what each level means

Tier 1 (Partial): Risk management is ad hoc and reactive. Individual heroics, no formal policy, limited executive awareness. Most small organizations start here.

Tier 2 (Risk Informed): Management has approved risk practices, but they are not consistently applied organization-wide. Some documentation exists. Common in mid-sized organizations.

Tier 3 (Repeatable): Practices are formally documented as policy, consistently applied, with defined metrics and periodic review. Regulatory compliance often requires Tier 3.

Tier 4 (Adaptive): Practices continuously improve based on real-time threat intelligence, lessons learned, and predictive analytics. Typical of mature security operations centers (SOC) and critical infrastructure operators.

Scoring honestly is critical — overrating your current state produces misleading gap analysis. Score where you ARE, not where you want to be.

How to use the assessment results

The radar chart shows your maturity profile across all 6 functions at a glance — a pentagon shape toward the outer rings indicates consistent maturity; a lopsided shape reveals which functions lag. Use this to brief executive stakeholders.

The Gap Analysis panel lists your five lowest-rated categories — these are your highest-priority remediation targets. Start with Govern and Identify gaps, since those enable all other functions.

The per-function score bars let you compare functions side-by-side. A Detect score of 1.5 while Protect is at 3.0 means you may be building walls without smoke detectors — events will occur and go unnoticed.

Export the text report to document your current baseline before a remediation program. Re-run the assessment quarterly to track improvement over time.

OT/ICS and industrial cybersecurity context

For operational technology (OT) and industrial control system (ICS) environments, NIST CSF 2.0 aligns closely with IEC 62443 security levels. OT-specific scoring considerations:

GV.SC (Supply Chain Risk): In OT, this includes vendor remote access controls, firmware authenticity, hardware supply chain, and vendor security requirements in procurement.

PR.PS (Platform Security): OT hardening follows different timelines — patching is constrained by operational windows. Score this category against OT-specific guidance, not IT timelines.

DE.CM (Continuous Monitoring): OT monitoring must be passive (no active scanning that can disrupt PLCs) — passive network traffic analysis tools like Claroty or Dragos are the appropriate control.

RS.CO (Incident Reporting): OT incidents may require reporting to sector-specific agencies (CISA, NRC, TSA) — factor this into your reporting process maturity score.

Frequently asked questions

What is NIST CSF 2.0 and what changed from CSF 1.1?

CSF 2.0 (February 2024) adds a sixth function — Govern — to address organizational context, risk strategy, roles, policy, oversight, and supply chain risk. CSF 1.1 had five functions: Identify, Protect, Detect, Respond, Recover. CSF 2.0 also reorganized categories, made supply chain risk a top-level concern, and added guidance for all organization sizes.

Are the four maturity tiers the same as CSF 1.1 tiers?

Largely yes. CSF 2.0 retains the same four tiers: Partial (1), Risk Informed (2), Repeatable (3), and Adaptive (4). The descriptions were refined in CSF 2.0 to be more outcome-oriented and better aligned with supply chain and governance themes, but the fundamental maturity ladder is unchanged.

How does this tool relate to IEC 62443 and ISO 27001?

NIST CSF is outcome-based (WHAT to achieve). IEC 62443 provides prescriptive controls for OT/ICS systems and defines Security Levels (SL 1–4) for zones and conduits. ISO 27001 is a certifiable ISMS standard with specific Annex A controls. All three are complementary — use NIST CSF at the enterprise level, IEC 62443 for OT architecture, and ISO 27001 if regulatory certification is required.

Can I use this assessment for regulatory compliance purposes?

This tool is for self-assessment and gap identification, not formal compliance documentation. For regulatory purposes (NERC CIP, HIPAA, PCI-DSS, FedRAMP, TSA Pipeline Security Directives), work with a licensed assessor or auditor. However, this assessment can serve as a useful preparation tool before a formal audit — it identifies gaps you can remediate in advance.

Which categories should I prioritize first if my overall score is low?

Prioritize in this order: (1) GV.RM and GV.RR — without executive support and clear ownership, nothing else sticks. (2) ID.AM — inventory your assets. (3) PR.AA — enforce least privilege and MFA. (4) DE.CM — implement basic logging and alerting. (5) RS.MA — document and test your incident response plan. Avoid the mistake of focusing on PR (protection) without DE (detection) — attackers who get past your perimeter will operate undetected indefinitely without monitoring.

Related tools & guides