Organizational Control: Permitted Actions Without Identification Or Authentication

Control ID: AC-14 Permitted Actions Without Identification Or Authentication Family: Access Control Source: NIST 800-53r4
Control: The organization:
  1. Identifies [Assignment: organization-defined user actions] that can be performed on the information system without identification or authentication consistent with organizational missions/business functions; and
  2. Documents and provides supporting rationale in the security plan for the information system, user actions not requiring identification or authentication.
Supplemental Guidance:
This control addresses situations in which organizations determine that no identification or authentication is required in organizational information systems. Organizations may allow a limited number of user actions without identification or authentication including, for example, when individuals access public websites or other publicly accessible federal information systems, when individuals use mobile phones to receive calls, or when facsimiles are received. Organizations also identify actions that normally require identification or authentication but may under certain circumstances (e.g., emergencies), allow identification or authentication mechanisms to be bypassed. Such bypasses may occur, for example, via a software-readable physical switch that commands bypass of the logon functionality and is protected from accidental or unmonitored use. This control does not apply to situations where identification and authentication have already occurred and are not repeated, but rather to situations where identification and authentication have not yet occurred. Organizations may decide that there are no user actions that can be performed on organizational information systems without identification and authentication and thus, the values for assignment statements can be none.

Related Controls: CP-2, IA-2
Control Enhancements: N/A
References: N/A
Mechanisms:
Protocol Implementation Conformance Statements: N/A