CIS Controls 5.5: Service Account Inventory & Review Process
Service accounts are a critical attack surface that often flies under the radar. CIS Controls 5.5 requires you to maintain a documented inventory of every service account, track ownership, and validate authorization quarterly. Without this foundation, dormant accounts become backdoors and unauthorized services proliferate across your infrastructure.
What this means
CIS 5.5 mandates that organizations document all service accounts with key metadata including department owner, last review date, and documented business purpose. Service accounts—non-human identities used by applications, scripts, and automated processes—must be reviewed at least every 90 days to confirm they remain authorized and actively used. Accounts found to be unnecessary or unauthorized should be deactivated or remediated immediately.
How to comply
- 1.Create a centralized inventory capturing all service accounts across systems, applications, and cloud infrastructure with owner name and business justification
- 2.Document review dates and establish a quarterly (or more frequent) review schedule with assigned accountability
- 3.Conduct quarterly reviews to verify each account is still authorized, actively used, and aligned with documented purpose
- 4.Deactivate or remove service accounts that fail authorization review or lack a current business justification
- 5.Maintain audit logs of all review cycles, findings, and remediation actions taken
Evidence auditors look for
- Service account inventory spreadsheet or CMDB listing account names, owners, departments, creation dates, and purposes
- Documented quarterly review records signed by account owners confirming authorization status
- Deactivation logs showing removal or remediation of unauthorized or orphaned service accounts
- Access logs demonstrating account usage patterns supporting the documented purpose
- Policy documentation defining the service account lifecycle, review frequency, and escalation procedures
Frequently asked questions
When will FAQs be available?
The FAQ for this control is currently being prepared.
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